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Consider yourself lucky if you’ve never experienced downtime caused by corruption or improper modifications. Unfortunately, luck runs out. When it comes to directory availability, don’t count on luck--count on Quest(R) Recovery Manager for Active Directory.
Recovery Manager empowers you with centralized backup and recovery for your directory in minutes--not days--with remote, online and granular restore capabilities. Minimize downtime and maintain user productivity.
During the first of two days of hearings Thursday in Brussels, Microsoft contended that it had met the requirements of its European Union (EU) antitrust charges and didn't deserve to be fined. The company also extended yet another olive branch to EU regulators, stating that it was "ready to do more." If the EU disagrees after two days of hearings, it will begin levying fines of as much as $2 million per day.
Microsoft was charged with violating EU antitrust laws in March 2004 and was originally supposed to meet the requirements of its antitrust charges by July 2004. In recent months, Microsoft and regulators at the European Commission (EC) have sparred over whether the company had met one of the requirements, which was to provide documentation and related technologies designed to help Microsoft's competitors interoperate with the company's server products. "Daily fines aren't the solution," Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith said. "We have complied beyond the requirements of the Commission's decision. But we can't do it alone. Interoperability in our industry happens through dialogue and engagement, not through fines."
Microsoft produced four companies--EMC, Network Appliance, StarBak, and TANDBERG Television--that said they've used Microsoft's server documentation and found it useful. An EU technical expert has referred to the documentation as "unusable."
Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
Lines and paragraphs break automatically. | http://www.itprotoday.com/windows-8/wininfo-daily-update-march-30-2006-microsoft-defends-pace-compliance-eu-hearing |
The risk actors behind RedLine and Vidar data stealers have been noticed pivoting to ransomware by phishing campaigns that unfold preliminary payloads signed with Prolonged Validation (EV) code signing certificates.
“This implies that the risk actors are streamlining operations by making their strategies multipurpose,” Development Micro researchers mentioned in a brand new evaluation printed this week.
Within the incident investigated by the cybersecurity firm, an unnamed sufferer is alleged to have first acquired a chunk of information stealer malware with EV code signing certificates, adopted by ransomware utilizing the identical supply method.
Previously, QakBot infections have leveraged samples signed with legitimate code signing certificates to bypass security protections.
The assaults begin with phishing emails that make use of well-worn lures to trick victims into working malicious attachments that masquerade as PDF or JPG photos however are literally executables that jump-start the compromise upon working.
Whereas the marketing campaign concentrating on the sufferer delivered stealer malware in July, a ransomware payload made its manner in early August after receiving an electronic mail message containing a bogus TripAdvisor grievance electronic mail attachment (“TripAdvisor-Grievance.pdf.htm”), triggering a sequence of steps that culminated within the deployment of ransomware.
See also MGM ransomware assault prices $100 million, in busy month for breaches “At this level, it’s price noting that not like the samples of the information stealer we investigated, the information used to drop the ransomware payload didn’t have EV certificates,” the researchers mentioned.
“Nevertheless, the 2 originate from the identical risk actor and are unfold utilizing the identical supply methodology. We are able to due to this fact assume a division of labor between the payload supplier and the operators.”
The event comes as IBM X-Power found new phishing campaigns spreading an improved model of a malware loader named DBatLoader, which was used as a conduit to distribute FormBook and Remcos RAR earlier this yr.
DBatLoader’s new capabilities facilitate UAC bypass, persistence, and course of injection, indicating that it is being actively maintained to drop malicious packages that may accumulate delicate data and allow distant management of programs.
The current set of assaults, detected since late June, are engineered to additionally ship commodity malware comparable to Agent Tesla and Warzone RAT. A majority of the e-mail messages have singled out English audio system, though emails in Spanish and Turkish have additionally been noticed.
See also It's a Zero-day? It's Malware? No! It's Username and Password
“In a number of noticed campaigns the risk actors leveraged ample management over the e-mail infrastructure to allow malicious emails to move SPF, DKIM, and DMARC electronic mail authentication strategies,” the corporate mentioned.
“A majority of campaigns leveraged OneDrive to stage and retrieve further payloads, with a small fraction in any other case using switch[.]sh or new/compromised domains.”
In associated information, Malwarebytes revealed {that a} new malvertising marketing campaign is concentrating on customers who’re trying to find Cisco’s Webex video conferencing software program on search engines like google like Google to redirect them to a faux web site that propagates the BATLOADER malware.
BATLOADER, for its half, establishes contact with a distant server to obtain a second-stage encrypted payload, which is one other identified stealer and keylogger malware known as DanaBot.
See also Sierra:21 - Flaws in Sierra Wi-fi Routers Expose Crucial Sectors to Cyber Attacks
A novel method adopted by the risk actor is using monitoring template URLs as a filtering and redirection mechanism to fingerprint and decide potential victims of curiosity. Guests who do not meet the factors (e.g., requests originating from a sandboxed atmosphere) are directed to the reliable Webex website.
“As a result of the advertisements look so reliable, there’s little doubt folks will click on them and go to unsafe websites,” Jérôme Segura, director of risk intelligence at Malwarebytes, mentioned.
“The kind of software program being utilized in these advertisements point out that risk actors are involved in company victims that may present them with credentials helpful for additional community ‘pentesting’ and, in some circumstances, ransomware deployment.” | https://blog.killnetswitch.com/cybercriminals-mix-phishing-and-ev-certificates-to-ship-ransomware-payloads/ |
There are many benefits to employing an anti virus for Apple pc. It detects viruses, malware, and other hazards that are specific to House windows systems, and it helps prevent contaminated files by being forwarding. In addition , you may scan individual files and removable press, and this downloads fresh information about malwares on a regular basis. In addition , you can drag & drop files in to the application windows to start a virus check. https://vpnfunclub.net/top-5-minecraft-errors-and-ways-to-fix-them/ The following are some of the top reasons to use a great antivirus to get Mac.
First of all, the best antivirus meant for Mac was made specifically for the Mac operating-system. It defends the system by phishing disorders and other malicious software. Some of the most popular malware suites pertaining to Mac possess advanced features such as real-time malware scanning service and prevention of ransomware. You might want to choose a free of charge Mac anti virus suite more than a paid antivirus for Windows. Sophos and Avira the two provide good cost-free options.
Great antivirus intended for Mac is TotalAV. This antivirus is particularly suitable for the Macintosh operating system. They have a built-in adware and spyware scanner, in addition to the ability to repair the macOS tools. Avira is another popular antivirus to get Mac, and it has a selection of added features, like a world wide web camera coverage. Overall, TotalAV offers a fantastic level of protection. If you’re looking for the best anti virus for your Apple pc, check out TotalAV and Intego. | http://medexaminer.net/2022/when-you-use-an-antivirus-for-apple-pc/ |
CHANDIGARH,14.11.23-Chandigarh Police is celebrating 15th Chandigarh Police Week from 14th to 19th November, 2023. During the celebration on 14th November, 2023 a “CYCLOTHON” event was organized at Sukhna Lake, at 7:30 Am.
The motive of this event was awareness to follow the Traffic Rules while driving the vehicle, to avoid drugs and make your life drug free and to support Cyber Swachhta Mission and take preventive measures while digital transactions. Students of Drug/Cyber/Traffic by Cyber Interns/Road Safety Rangers/SPC/Urja Ek Nayi Kiran were the part of this Cycle rally.
Use NCB Drug Abuse Awareness Helpline No. 94177-73344, and Chandigarh Police Drug Abuse Awareness Team Helpline No. 70872- 39010.
Use Helpline No. 1073 for any traffic related issues/problems.
Turn on 2-step verification/authentication for all Social Media Accounts and for net banking apps/wallets. Select privacy setting as only me/friends on social media accounts.
Avoid friendship with unknown people (especially foreigner) on social media platforms. | https://amihackerproof.com/police-station-cyber-crime-sector-cybercrime-computerhacker/ |
Critical information about 46 million Malaysians were leaked online onto the Dark Web. The stolen data included mobile phone numbers from telcos and mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs), prepaid phone numbers, customers details including physical addresses – and even the unique IMEI and IMSI registration numbers associated with SIM cards.
That’s pretty bad, right? The carriers included Altel, Celcom, DiGi, Enabling Asia, Friendimobile, Maxis, MerchantTradeAsia, PLDT, RedTone, TuneTalk, Umobile and XOX; news about the breach were first published 19 October 2017 by a Malaysian online community.
When did the breach occur? According to lowyat.net, “Time stamps on the files we downloaded indicate the leaked data was last updated between May and July 2014 between the various telcos.”
That’s more than three years between theft of the information and its discovery. We have no idea if the carriers had already discovered the losses, and chose not to disclose the breaches.
A huge delay between a breach and its disclosure is not unusual. Perhaps things will change once the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) kicks in next year, when organizations must reveal a breach within three days of discovery. That still leaves the question of discovery. It simply takes too long!
Verizon’s Data Breach Investigations Report for 2017 has some depressing news: “Breach timelines continue to paint a rather dismal picture — with time-to-compromise being only seconds, time-to-exfiltration taking days, and times to discovery and containment staying firmly in the months camp. Not surprisingly, fraud detection was the most prominent discovery method, accounting for 85% of all breaches, followed by law enforcement which was seen in 4% of cases.” | http://alanzeichick.com/2017/11/long-delays-cyberattacks-discovery-disclosure.html |
Cybersecurity threats and issues are increasing and evolving continuously, seemingly at warp speed. It is difficult to keep up with it all—but it is imperative that every organization does everything possible to protect its networks, systems and devices from cyberattacks. This is especially true of organizations that provide mission-critical, life-saving services, e.g., law enforcement agencies, fire/rescue departments, emergency medical services agencies and emergency communications centers, aka 911 centers.
To help in this regard, MCP last year started to issue advisories to its clients regarding potential cybersecurity issues. We issue these advisories—which identify vulnerabilities and exploits that could threaten the operations of mission-critical communications networks and systems—as soon as we learn of the threat.
Today we are ramping up our effort by launching a new series of monthly video chats in which I will summarize the most recent threats, share information from entities such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and offer tips for preventing cyberattacks and mitigating them if they occur. The first video can be viewed below.
As always, MCP’s cybersecurity subject-matter experts stand ready to help your agency with all of its cybersecurity needs, from network and system vulnerability assessments to developing comprehensive strategic plans, disaster-recovery plans and continuity-of-operations plans. Please reach out.
Mike Beagles is MCP’s platform and service product manager and a certified Cisco CyberOps associate. He has more than 13 years of IT and cybersecurity experience. Mike can be emailed at [email protected]. | https://resources.missioncriticalpartners.com/insights/mcp-launches-video-chats-to-keep-clients-current-on-cybersecurity-threats |
Atlanta, GA, United States, 2010/02/12 - Utilities may now ensure safety and security with Customizable Workplace Compliance Programs for their Personnel and Contractors. Your Banner Ad Here instead - Showing along with ALL Articles covering Software Announcements Replace these Affiliate Programs at ANYTIME! Your banner here within the next hour. Learn How!
Atlanta-based e-VERIFILE.COM Inc. is pleased to announce that it has launched UtilitySafe, the latest in the company�s line of administrative management and risk assessment systems. �Utilities are extremely important and are very highly regulated industries,� says Devon Wijesinghe, e-VERIFILE�s Chief Strategy Officer. �By implementing UtilitySafe, we will help utility administrators and managers comply with industry safety standards and secure important assets,� Wijesinghe added.
UtilitySafe streamlines routine contractor and workforce management activities for electric, gas, telecom, and water utilities as well as the businesses that serve them. These organizations utilize the management and risk assessment service to facilitate a range of daily administrative tasks while ensuring compliance with local, state and federal safety/security requirements. To use the service, utilities and related enterprises simply subscribe to UtilitySafe and log in to create their own Workplace Compliance Programs. Compliance Programs can be customized to focus on a number of mission-critical issues including: Corporate Responsibility, Employee Performance, Workplace Safety & Security, Workplace/Supplier Diversity and more.
Once the organization�s program has been created, they then require their personnel and/or contractors to participate online. Participants visit UtilitySafe where they establish an account and log in to comply with the programs. Successful compliance with the programs determines eligibility to access select facilities and jobsites or to receive associated ID badges or other credentials.
No additional software or equipment is required to use UtilitySafe and the system can be securely accessed from any PC, anywhere at any time. Utilities and their contractors log in and manage the entire process from one, easy-to-use, web-based platform at utilitysafe.com. For more on information on UtilitySafe�s risk assessment capabilities, please contact e-VERIFILE at 770 859-9899.
| Publisher Contact: Tony Cooper - e-VERIFILE.com 770-859-9899 pr[.]e-verifile.com Newswire Today - PRZOOM / PRTODAY disclaims any content contained in this article. If you need/wish to contact the company who published the current release, you will need to contact them - NOT us. Issuers of articles are solely responsible for the accuracy of their content. Our complete disclaimer appears here.
IMPORTANT INFORMATION: Issuance, publication or distribution of this press release in certain jurisdictions could be subject to restrictions. The recipient of this press release is responsible for using this press release and the information herein in accordance with the applicable rules and regulations in the particular jurisdiction. This press release does not constitute an offer or an offering to acquire or subscribe for any e-VERIFILE.com�, Inc. securities in any jurisdiction including any other companies listed or named in this release. | http://www.newswiretoday.com/news/64981/e-VERIFILE.COM-Launches-Workforce-Management-and-Risk-Assessment-Service-UtilitySafe/ |
As expected, Apple tried to turn this week's iPhone 4 preorder disaster into a PR win, noting that customers preordered a record 600,000 devices on Tuesday. And although iPhone 4 sales will no doubt beat previous Apple records, there's no escaping a simple truth: Google's competing Android system has already surpassed the iPhone platform in the United States from a market-share perspective and will do so worldwide by the end of 2010. And perhaps as early as 2011, Android will permanently supplant the iPhone from a usage-share perspective as well.
Apple's announcement of the 600,000 preorders came in the wake of a separate AT&T statement noting that iPhone preorders were "ten times higher" than those of any previous iPhone. This suggests that worldwide preorders for the previous device, the iPhone 3GS, were relatively low—in the 60,000 to 100,000 unit range. (AT&T preorders account only for the United States.)
AT&T also noted that its website was visited about 13 million times on Tuesday as customers attempted to check their upgrade eligibility and preorder the iPhone 4. Some customers apparently were erroneously shown other people's account information, though most people of course simply couldn't get through. It's unclear whether the 13 million figure represents "successful" visits or all visits.
Based on these figures, analysts rapidly upgraded their sales forecasts for the iPhone 4, including the infamous Gene Munster, who comically overestimated iPad first-week sales based on similar preorder craziness, only to later be confronted by Apple's much-smaller actual sales. But suffice it to say, the iPhone 4 will be a blockbuster hit for the company, in part because so many AT&T customers are now in the final year of a two-year contract and are thus eligible for lower upgrade pricing.
And that's part of the problem for Apple: Though it will sell millions of these devices in the next few months, most of those sales are going to existing iPhone users. That's good for AT&T—customers will be stuck with the clueless wireless carrier for another two years—but doesn't help Apple beat back Android, its fast-moving rival.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs presented some information at the iPhone 4 announcement a few weeks ago that sought to contradict reports that Android was already surpassing the Apple mobile platform. But the numbers Jobs used were a smokescreen, mixing "market share" (unit sales) with "usage share" (installed base) while suggesting that market share was something one could infer, or read differently, when nothing could be further from the truth. All he really showed was that the iPhone, which had a two-year head start on Android, has a larger installed base of users (and, correspondingly, a much larger ecosystem of apps and other content).
This information is true, but obvious and beside the point. According to recent market share—that is, actual unit sales—data, the Android platform is outselling the iPhone in the United States and will soon be doing so worldwide. The reasons for this are as obvious as they are simple. Android devices are made and sold by a wide variety of hardware makers and delivered to consumers through all major wireless carriers, not just through a single carrier, like the iPhone is with AT&T in the United States.
Android is also updated much more aggressively than the iPhone—a side effect of its relatively late start in the market—and thus new Android-based devices, with new capabilities, appear much more frequently. Since the end of 2009, the Android market has had several unqualified hits (Verizon's Droid, HTC Droid Incredible, and HTC Evo, among others), all of which came with major hardware and software advances. Meanwhile, Apple updates the iPhone only once a year, and last year's upgrade, the 3GS, was a tepid improvement over its predecessor. No Android phones have individually outsold the iPhone for any appreciable amount of time, but none need to: The huge market of available Android devices, together, outperforms Apple's small selection of iPhones, much like the PC market overwhelmed, and now continues to dwarf, the Mac market.
Apple's hope, going forward, is that it can turn the iPhone into a high-end, more desirable device, much like the Mac or a BMW, while extending its underlying software platform, iOS, into more devices and form factors. The iPad is the first major departure along these lines—iOS is also the basis for the iPhone-like iPod touch—but it's not hard to imagine this system later being subsumed into Macs and then ultimately replacing today's Mac OS X software.
This is speculative, and of course such a transition would take years and many refinements. But if Apple has proven itself adept at anything, it's moving forward and aggressive replacing the old with the new. | http://www.itprotoday.com/management-mobility/record-iphone-4-preorders-wont-stop-android-invasion |
When George Washington started the tradition of swearing in on a bible, he probably couldn't have dreamed of electronic ink.
On Monday, Suzi LeVine became the first U.S. ambassador to be sworn in on a Kindle. LeVine, who is the American representative to Switzerland, took the oath over a digital copy of the U.S. Constitution while being sworn in by Vice President Joe Biden. Geekwire has an excerpt from the ceremony, in which LeVine explains her decision to use the Kindle:
“As cool as a copy of the Constitution from the 18th century would have been, I wanted to use a copy that is from the 21st century and that reflects my passion for technology and my hope for the future,” LeVine said.
A very 21st century swearing in; @AmbSuzi becomes the 1st U.S. Ambassador to take the oath over an electronic device. pic.twitter.com/5E4bjIRQ2x
— U.S. Embassy London (@USAinUK) June 2, 2014
Most importantly, she added, “it symbolizes for me the very best of our nation—especially around innovation, entrepreneurship, and the voice that each of us has in our democracy.”
Also, LeVine admitted, the Kindle was what she had on hand.
As the Washington Post points out, this isn't the first time someone has used a digital device for swearing in. A group of New Jersey firefighters receiving promotions used an iPad in lieu of a paper bible last year, and a Long Island official took the oath on an iPad earlier this year.
But for a U.S. ambassador, LeVine's Kindle oath-taking is believed to be the first. It's as good a sign as any that we live in the future. Related: | http://www.pcworld.com/article/2358646/u-s-ambassador-decides-to-get-sworn-in-on-a-kindle.html |
LAS VEGAS-- The multifunction printers found in many offices are not dumb devices, but are computers that can be hacked, a security expert has warned.
In a presentation at the Black Hat security conference, Brendan O'Connor, a security expert at an unnamed U.S. financial company, showed how he could gain control over a Xerox device and wreak all kinds of havoc.
"Stop treating them as printers. Treat them as servers, as workstations," O'Connor said in his presentation on Thursday. Printers should be part of a company's patch program and be carefully managed, not forgotten by IT and handled by the most junior person on staff, he said.
In the case of the Xerox system, O'Connor said the multifunction device was, in essence, a Linux server. He was able to exploit a weakness in the security of the device and gain full control of the machine. O'Connor noted that he also looked at devices from other manufacturers and found similar security faults, but did not list any names.
Once a printer was under his control, O'Connor said he would be able to use it to map an organization's internal network--a situation that could help stage further attacks. The breach gave him access to any of the information printed, copied or faxed from the device. He could also change the internal job counter--which can reduce, or increase, a company's bill if the device is leased, he said.
The printer break-in also enables a number of practical jokes, such as sending print and scan jobs to arbitrary workers' desktops, O'Connor said. Also, devices could be programmed to include, for example, an image of a paper clip on every print, fax or copy, ultimately driving office staffers to take the machine apart looking for the paper clip.
One of the weaknesses in the Xerox system is an unsecured boot loader, the technology that loads the basic software on the device, O'Connor said. Other flaws lie in the device's Web interface and in the availability of services such as the Simple Network Management Protocol and Telnet, he said.
O'Connor informed Xerox of the problems in January. The company did issue a fix for its WorkCentre 200 series, it said in a statement. "Thanks to Brendan's efforts, we were able to post a patch for our customers in mid-January which fixes the issues," a Xerox representative said in an e-mailed statement.
However, O'Connor believes the fix is inadequate, and therefore he decided to make the presentation at Black Hat. The threat is real, even though printers are mostly on internal networks, he said. "There is always the insider threat," O'Connor said.
Be respectful, keep it civil and stay on topic. We delete comments that violate our policy, which we encourage you to read. Discussion threads can be closed at any time at our discretion.
Next Article: Apple's iOS 13 just launched but iOS 13.1, iPadOS arrive next week | https://www.cnet.com/news/printers-a-weak-link-in-network-security/ |
Host: sydneyexclusiveescorts.com
Referer: http://www.google.com/search?q=sydneyexclusiveescorts.com
Query: http://www.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?site=sydneyexclusiveescorts.com
Result: This site is not currently listed as suspicious.
Query: http://yandex.com/infected?l10n=en&url=http://sydneyexclusiveescorts.com/
Result: sydneyexclusiveescorts.com is not infected or malware details are not published yet. | http://evuln.com/tools/malware-scanner/sydneyexclusiveescorts.com/ |
If you work for a publicly traded company, a bank, or a healthcare organization, chances are you've already come into contact with IT auditors from your company's internal audit department, public auditors, or some type of government regulator or examiner. Even small companies aren't exempt from the IT audit process. If you provide services for larger public or regulated firms, your business partners will want assurance that sufficient controls are in place to protect their interests and prevent exposing them to risk. To provide that assurance, you'll probably have to let the business partner's IT auditors or an independent firm perform-an audit of your IT controls.
The knee-jerk reaction by many IT pros is to resent or even resist IT auditors and their processes or, at best, view audits as a necessary evil. But you might as well embrace the audit process and reap as much value from it as possible. Depending on the auditors, you might be able to use an audit as an opportunity to improve security, policy, and technical controls. By cooperating with auditors and understanding the real business goals behind the audit, you could also preempt recommendations that are off target and a waste of effort. To better cooperate with IT auditors, it helps to understand what they're looking for and how they work.
How Auditors Operate
Quite often a team of auditors will conduct the audit. This team might consist of a partner you rarely see but who signs off on the final audit, a senior auditor who directs the team, and two or three younger auditors who churn through the various reports, logs, documentation, and interviews collectively referred to as evidence. It's good to be aware of the various roles of team members so you communicate with the right people at the right time.
Make sure you understand the scope of an auditor's project. Public accounting firm auditors and government examiners usually operate within a limited scope that corresponds to their legislative mandate. For instance, if you work for a publicly held company, public auditors will focus on systems and applications that are termed financially significant; they'll also focus on controls that ensure the integrity of the company's financial statements. (See the sidebar "The Importance of Controls" for more information about this critical aspect of the IT audit.) Bank examiners focus on privacy of customer information and the safety and soundness of the bank. In the healthcare industry, the focus is on privacy of patient information.
Internal auditors, on the other hand, have a much broader scope because they're usually charged with identifying any type of risk to the company. Sometimes internal auditors also have a mandate to identify inefficient processes and waste.
Auditors will often know less than you do about Windows and other technologies, but don't write off their observations or methods. A good IT auditor can apply a fairly uniform product/technology methodology and identify risks or inadequate controls in your company.
Alternatively, many auditors rely on a work program, or audit program, to tell them what information to request and how to analyze it. Unfortunately, most audit programs I've seen for Windows and Active Directory (AD) are incomplete or ask for inconsequential or outdated information. However, unless a request is time consuming, I recommend cooperation; you'll get a chance to respond to the auditors' observations before the report is finalized.
Remember that auditors like documentation. This isn't because they're paper pushers but rather because audit techniques and legislation such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) require documentation to demonstrate that a process is actually followed. Claiming that you evaluate each security update as it's released isn't the same as producing brief minutes from each meeting in which you discussed the latest security updates from Microsoft and other vendors.
Audit reports vary slightly in format but generally consist of a list of observations or findings. Each finding will have a description of the risk, a recommendation, and usually a high, low, or medium criticality or priority rating. If the auditor can't make a good argument for considering the finding a risk, then it probably shouldn't be on the report, and you might consider making a case for having it removed before the final report comes out, depending on the dynamics of the audit process at your organization. Most audit processes also provide for management responses to each finding. These responses are documented at some point in the audit or follow-up work. When auditors cite or recommend a best practice, they're referring to a method or standard recognized as the preferred way to handle some task, whether it's managing access control or security updates.
A Win-Win Situation
An audit can be a positive thing. The audit report might identify some important areas in which you could improve security. Furthermore, auditors can often give you the needed justification for changing security processes or investing in security technology that you've been unsuccessful getting approved on your own. At the same time, cooperating with the auditors helps build your reputation as a team player and results in a better audit. | http://www.itprotoday.com/systems-management/embrace-it-audit |
As ransomware attacks continue to evolve and become more complex, the threat from ransomware is quickly becoming a top concern for security leaders.
The ransomware threat landscape has diversified and evolved since the first reported ransomware incident in 1989. With more than 400 ransomware families to date, the world is in the grips of a new epidemic. These attacks are growing increasingly more sophisticated and dangerous. Upwards of half a million people are hit by these attacks every year.
13 Layers will collaborate with your organization to simulate sophisticated ransomware attacks using our custom-built attack and breach simulation technology. We will even help you train and develop your own playbooks to react accordingly. | https://13layers.com/ransomware-attack-simulation/ |
Internet access is as crucial to everyday life as having a phone connection and the loss of connectivity is deserving of financial compensation, the German Federal Court of Justice has ruled.
Because having an Internet connection is so significant for a large part of the German population, a customer whose service provider failed to provide connectivity between December 2008 and February 2009 is entitled to compensation, the court ruled Thursday.
"It is the first time the court ruled that an Internet connection is as important a commodity as having a phone," said court spokeswoman Dietlind Weinland.
The plaintiff was erroneously disconnected and demanded that the unnamed telecommunications company pay for costs that incurred in switching to a new provider. The plaintiff also demanded compensation of A!50 (US$67) per day for the period his was unable to use his DSL, fax over IP and VoIP services, according to a news release from the court.
The Federal Court, however, awarded compensation only for loss of the Internet connection. Compensation for the loss of a fax connection was denied because a fax only enables the user to send text and images faster than conventional mail and the technology is increasingly becoming irrelevant due to the rise of alternatives such as email, the court ruled.
While a phone connection is an important commodity, the plaintiff was also denied compensation for loss of his VoIP phone line since he owned a mobile phone, said Weinland.
But the plaintiff is entitled to compensation for the lost DSL line because the Internet has been a crucial part of people's economic living standards for a while now, the court ruled.
The Internet is important because it offers access to information in the form of text, images, video and audio files. Almost all subjects are covered on the Internet, from light entertainment to highly scientific topics, the court said.
Because of its availability, the Internet increasingly replaces other media such as encyclopedias, magazines or TV, and it also enables a global exchange between its users via email, forums, blogs and social networks, the court said. In addition, the Internet is increasingly used for the initiation and conclusion of contracts as well as for legal transactions and the fulfilment of public service obligations, it added.
Loek is Amsterdam Correspondent and covers online privacy, intellectual property, open-source and online payment issues for the IDG News Service. Follow him on Twitter at @loekessers or email tips and comments to [email protected] | https://www.cio.com/article/2388916/having-an-internet-connection-is-crucial-to-everyday-life--german-federal-court-says.html |
At DockerCon in San Francisco today, IBM announced IBM Containers, an enterprise-class containers based on Docker and built on Big Blue's Bluemix platform-as-a-service (PaaS). The service, IBM says, is intended to help developers deliver applications across hybrid cloud environments. IBM also announced that it has joined with a number of partners to create the Open Container Platform (OCP), a coalition intended to ensure that containers are interoperable, fostering the rapid growth of container-based solutions. One cloud vision"Our strategy around cloud is to make all of these clouds behave as one," says Angel Diaz, vice president of Cloud Architecture & Technology at IBM. "No application, no solution is an island. Everything is connected." [ Related: IBM Bluemix powers hybrid cloud apps for IoT, analytics ] Diaz notes that IBM is already a strong Docker supporter — it is number three in overall commits to the open source container technology. When it comes to containers, he says, delivering them via the cloud is not enough. Developers need containers with advanced capabilities that allow production applications to be easily deployed and managed. IBM Containers is designed to support DevOps through the capability to build, automate and orchestrate the deployment of multi-platform, multi-container and traditional workloads together in application environments. Diaz notes that it can help move workloads across various cloud environments with enterprise-class management and security, regardless of the phase of the application or delivery pipeline — development, test, staging or production. IBM Containers features include the following:
Integrated Tools. These tools include log analytics, performance monitoring and lifecycle management to simplify the delivery pipeline.
Elastic Scaling and Auto Recovery. These features provide resources when they are most needed.
Zero Downtime Deployments. This feature utilizes Active Deploy to ensure users aren't affected by application enhancements.
Private Overlays, Load Balancing and Automated Routing. These features enable capabilities to address the most complex business requirements.
Support for Persistent Storage. This feature allows for data-centric application creation.
Automated Image Security and Vulnerability Scanning. The Vulnerability Advisor alerts you to security weaknesses before deployment.
Access to Bluemix Services. It provides access to IBM's catalog of more than 100 cloud services, including Watson, Analytics, IoT and Mobile.
IBM has also integrated the on-premise Docker Trusted Registry software with its DevOps and Cloud offerings, including IBM UrbanCode and IBM Pure Application Systems. [ Related: Review: IBM Bluemix Bulks Up Cloud Foundry ]"For the first time now, our clients will be able to create containers on-premises, off-premise, automate the build of these containers and scale them," Diaz says. "Monitoring and logging are supported. "Containing vulnerable codeDiaz adds that one of the biggest challenges with containers currently is that they can contain vulnerable code. Since the whole idea is to allow developers to use containers to build micro-services that can then be strung together to rapidly build new services, it is essential to detect if something in a container hasn't been patched or has known vulnerabilities before those containers come to serve as the foundation of all manner of services. Not only does the Vulnerability Advisor help users detect vulnerable containers, Diaz says, IBM Containers also provides the ability to write policies around containers. Late-stage startup Mindjet, known for its Spigit crowdsourcing platform, is an early adopter of IBM Containers. The Spigit team has been experiencing annual growth of more than 30 percent, leading to escalating operations costs and scaling limitations as a result of its existing infrastructure. The company says it turned to IBM Containers on Bluemix to help its development teams operate more efficiently, innovate with speed, improve engagement and boost productivity. "While we started our application development on Heroku, it wasn't long before the resulting operations costs started to overtax our team, limiting us in terms of development and pace capabilities," Mindjet CTO James Gardner said in a statement. "The agile and open capabilities of IBM's Bluemix, including the new Docker-based IBM Container services, helped us cut our deployment times to mere seconds and increase our freedom to do what every startup wants to do more of, focus on innovation for our clients. "Follow Thor on Google+
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Apple Pencil: 9 great note-taking apps The Apple Pencil is an amazing tool for taking notes, and in this roundup you'll find nine of the best... | http://www.cio.com/article/2938555/it-industry/ibm-announces-container-service-for-bluemix.html |
WASHINGTON, March 3 (UPI) -- The Einstein program -- the most significant element yet unveiled of the classified multibillion-dollar cybersecurity initiative President Bush signed last month -- will still leave the U.S. government's IT security lagging the private sector, say lawmakers and industry experts. At a hearing last week on Capitol Hill, officials faced close, skeptical questioning about the program, an intrusion detection system that will automatically monitor and analyze Internet traffic into and out of federal computer networks in real time -- allowing officials at the Department of Homeland Security to scan for anomalies that might represent hackers or other intruders trying to gain access or steal data.
"There are still some gaping holes," said Rep. James Langevin, D-R.I., of the House Homeland Security Committee.
Officials at the hearing linked Einstein with the White House Office of Management and Budget's Trusted Internet Connections initiative. TIC requires all federal departments and agencies to report on all their external network connections, with the aim of reducing the current 4,000 or so across the federal government down to 50 by June this year.
Einstein will be deployed at all those points of access, Scott Charbo, the Homeland Security official responsible for the program, told United Press International in a recent interview.
Departments and agencies will "deploy the sensors to the portals identified" as being among the 50 or so that will remain open, he said.
But some Democrats and industry observers are skeptical about Einstein's capabilities.
"It is not timely," said Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., "I don't get any sense of urgency, I don't think much of it will work."
Harman added that the private sector considers Einstein "too passive" and believes "it doesn't deliver information in real time."
Intrusion detection and analysis programs like Einstein "are absolutely standard in the private sector," Casey Potenzone, chief information officer of computer security firm Uniloc, told UPI. "It is not revolutionary or state of the art," he added, calling the rollout of the program across federal networks "very logical and something that should have been done a long time ago."
Ken Silva, formerly a senior official with the National Security Agency now in the private sector, told UPI that one of the problems that had delayed the policy process was the lack of clear lines of authority.
"Why didn't they do that before? Who would decide to? There was no clear decision-maker in that process," he said, noting that the directive signed last month by President Bush had made the National Security Agency "the central authority to oversee security for all government networks. "Until you have one central authority, how do you make a (security) mandate" (for federal network managers), said Silva, who is now chief technology officer of the company that runs the backbone of the U.S. Internet infrastructure, VeriSign Inc.
Robert Jamison, undersecretary for national protection and programs at the Department of Homeland Security and Charbo's boss, told the hearing that Einstein, currently deployed at DHS and a handful of other government agencies, was being re-vamped for its rollout across all the federal networks.
Einstein currently collects information about traffic flows, and network managers analyze it daily, looking at where on the Internet so-called data packets that make up Web traffic are headed. But Jamison told the hearing that the new version, for which officials have requested an additional $115 million this year, will collect network traffic flow data in real time and also analyze the content of some communications, looking for malicious code, for example in e-mail attachments.
"Where we want to go is we want to be able to detect the malicious code that we know about," he said. "When an adversary or an intrusion has a signature of malicious code, we want the (Einstein) sensors to be able to scan for that malicious code and alert us."
Charbo told the hearing another change being made was to get security clearances for chief information officers and their top IT security staff, "so that no longer are they just getting an unclassified brief. "Quite honestly ," he added, "what you get in that (unclassified) state is just a piece of information that's very difficult to interpret back to any attribution at all or to identify what the gaps are."
In response to privacy concerns, Jamison noted that Einstein's capacity was no different from that in commercial IT security systems that federal departments already employed.
"They all have commercial capability to do intrusion detection," he said. "What is different is that we're going to have comprehensive coverage" across federal networks, and that all the information about potential intrusions or malicious code would flow to a central point, the U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team at DHS.
"We've had our privacy folks and our civil rights folks involved in this from the very start," he told the hearing, adding a required privacy impact assessment for the new program was being prepared.
Silva noted that even checking for potential malicious code, which can be done by a program that automatically scans incoming e-mail for instance, was not a problem in privacy terms.
"That kind of analysis and monitoring is quite different from anyone actually reading the content" of an e-mail, he said.
Because hackers, including those believed employed by nation states like China, are now so adept at fooling users into downloading malicious software from the Internet or e-mail, and the software can hide so deeply in a computer's operating system, many see traffic analysis -- which can spot a computer worm propagating itself through a network for instance -- as a vital part of any IT security strategy.
Charbo told UPI there were currently no plans to look at one of the more extreme options currently being considered by network security managers at the Department of Defense -- that of banning all non-official traffic.
"We'll be looking at a lot of what (the Department of Defense) is doing," he said, but added that the idea of TIC was to provide a baseline in terms of security policies upon which agencies could then build.
Certainly policies will change over time," he said. "They'll be policies for all federal networks … agencies can make more restrictive rules for the networks they manage."
Silva acknowledged that security on U.S. government unclassified networks had been poor but said the technological centralization of Einstein, and the policy centralization of putting the NSA in charge, was the foundation for success.
"We've taken the first step," he said.
United Press International is a leading provider of news, photos and information to millions of readers around the globe via UPI.com and its licensing services.
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A Spanish version of the site reaches millions of readers in Latin America and beyond. | http://www.upi.com/Top_News/Special/2008/03/03/Analysis-Einstein-and-US-cybersecurity/UPI-23431204569280/ |
Microsoft recently released SQL Server 2000 Windows CE Edition. Although SQL Server CE is an important product, I don't know when companies will start clamoring for CE-savvy SQL Server professionals. You might not have to worry about wireless for another 5 years, or this winter you could suddenly find yourself in charge of a lovely holiday-season project. Either way, SQL Server CE is a great a niche skill to have now. And the age of ubiquitous SQL Server CE deployments might be closer than you realize. Here's why.
Several months ago, I received a Pocket PC as a gift. It's sleek, silvery, and very cool, and it impressed all my friends. For the first few weeks, I used my Pocket PC regularly, then the bother of syncing up the device with my desktop started to get on my nerves. The process wasn't hard, but I'm the kind of guy who never changes TV channels if the remote isn't within reaching distance of the couch. In my world, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) don't have enough bang for the buck to make them worth my while. I suspect many of you feel the same way.
But real wireless connectivity will change our minds. Every time I used my Pocket PC, I thought, "Wouldn't it be cool if I could be online right now?" I'm not talking about kludgy connectivity through a cell phone at a pitiful modem-uplink speed. I'm talking about real, instant-on, reasonable-bandwidth Internet connectivity that doesn't drain my wallet. Today, real wireless with a Pocket PC is difficult to achieve and simply too expensive to be practical for most people. But that scenario is starting to change. Wireless ISP providers are providing better coverage and dropping their prices. Just as important, Microsoft's newest embedded OS, code-named Talisker (see the second URL below), will include native support for Bluetooth and other important wireless-connectivity options. Microsoft will build in real wireless from the ground up rather than adding it as an afterthought. That foresight will make all the difference because mobile, PDA-style devices will truly become ubiquitous and will generate entirely new classes of personal and business handheld applications that will all need a data store. Can you say "SQL Server CE"?
Today, SQL Server CE opportunities are few and far between, but they're getting closer to home. And, it's never too early to begin learning a next-generation technology that's bound to change the way we live. Take a minute to check out the new SQL Server CE 1.1 release. If you don't have time (or a Pocket PC) to play with SQL Server CE, at least download the product and browse the documents so that you'll be familiar with the architectural differences between SQL Server CE and its big brother. You'll find a download link and additional SQL Server CE resources on Microsoft's Web site. | http://www.itprotoday.com/microsoft-sql-server/wireless-pda-connectivity-and-sql-server |
The offices of Zynga, Pinterest, AirBnB and other companies in San Francisco's South of Market District were under lockdown Friday after a shooting at a nearby store located in the same building as AirBnB's headquarters.
Two people were killed and one was injured in the incident at a jewelry store at 888 Brannan St. at about 2 p.m. local time Friday, according to local news reports.
The suspect emerged from the store "covered in blood" and fired at police before he apparently ran out of ammunition and surrendered, the San Jose Mercury News reported. No police were injured and no motive had been determined, the paper said.
The jewelry store, near the corner of 8th and Brannan streets, is in the basement of a large building that's also the site of AirBnB's new headquarters a few floors up.
That part of SOMA is also home to a cluster of tech firms that have sprung up over the past few years, including Zynga, which is a block away on 8th and Townsend, Pinterest and Yammer, which is a few blocks up the street.
Several employees at the companies said on Twitter they were told not to leave their building for their own safety. Traffic was backed up for several blocks on adjacent streets and a police helicopter circled for most of the afternoon, but police reportedly think the suspect acted alone.
"For Zyngites safety, Security has a lock down on our building. Until Security receives clearance from SFPD the building will remain on lockdown and exiting will be restricted," Zynga employees were told via email on Friday, according to a screenshot posted to Twitter by an employee.
AirBnB, Zynga and Pinterest didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.
James Niccolai covers data centers and general technology news for IDG News Service. Follow James on Twitter at @jniccolai. James's e-mail address is [email protected]
Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. Read our affiliate link policy for more details. | https://www.pcworld.com/article/2044331/shooting-in-building-where-airbnb-is-based-leaves-two-dead.html |
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A new kind of attack is targeting unsecured Internet of Things devices by scrambling their code and rendering them useless.
Radware first spotted the newly found “BrickerBot” malware last month after it started hitting its own honeypots, logging hundreds of infection attempts over a few days. When the malware connects to a device with their default usernames and passwords — often easily found on the internet — the malware corrupts the device’s storage, leading to a state of permanent denial-of-service (PDoS) attack, also known as “bricking.”
This attack “damages a system so badly that it requires replacement or reinstallation of hardware.”
It’s a novel take on an ongoing security problem with IoT devices: Botnets typically infect unsecured devices that are enlisted as part of wider bandwidth-stealing attacks to bring down websites and services by overwhelming them with traffic.
Mike Rawson has recently re-awoken a long-standing interest in robots and our automated future.
He lives in London with a single android – a temperamental vacuum cleaner – but is looking forward to getting more cyborgs soon.
This is the story of a week with Alexa – my first week.
I haven’t ever before to my knowledge bought a device on it’s first day of release (or to be more accurate, pre-ordered two weeks before something was available).
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Today’s post is about how technology might disrupt the education system, with a particular focus on MOOCs.
Watson
Watson is an IBM supercomputer that uses AI (natural language processing and machine learning) to answer questions and shot to fame when it won the US quiz show Jeopardy in 2011.
IT and the Long Tail
The Long Tail is a concept popularised by British-American writer Chris Anderson, first in an 2004 article in Wired Magazine (where he was editor), and then later in a book of the same name. | http://robotwatch.co/homeland-security-warns-brickerbot-malware-destroys-unsecured-internet-connected-devices-zdnet |
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Phishing can be a serious problem for businesses, but IT administrators can fight back by incorporating software-as-a-service PhishMe (starting at $10,000 depending on users and service level) into their employee training program. Users are bombarded with malicious emails with specially crafted attachments or links to suspicious websites, and often have trouble recognizing them as being malicious. While administrators can beef up email security to prevent these messages from landing in user inboxes in the first place, they also need to teach users to recognize and not open those messages. It takes just one unsuspecting user to compromise a company, and PhishMe is designed to make employees more aware of the dangers.
PhishMe's training platform allows administrators to send out mail to employees that look like commonly seen phishing campaigns. If the employees click on the link in the message or open the accompanying attachment, they see a notification screen explaining they'd just opened a message sent to them as part of a training simulation. PhishMe provides information about the scam to give the user immediate feedback to help them recognize these types of messages later. The administrator can monitor overall performance and repeat offenders. Through the campaign management portal, administrators can track what employees are learning, and the types of scams they may be more susceptible to.
PhishMe takes a similar approach to Wombat Security's PhishGuru, our Editors' Choice for antiphishing training, with multiple phishing templates and training documents. PhishMe has a richer interface and offers more in-depth training and reports, but there were several areas that felt a little rough. On their own, the problem spots wouldn't have been a big deal, but considering how well thought-out the rest of the platform was, the issues were jarring.
Like PhishGuru, PhishMe requires the test domain to be whitelisted to ensure the test messages can be delivered. Businesses planning on running PhishMe will need to work very closely with IT before attempting the project to work around spam filters and other email security products in place. It's also possible to set up the platform to test across multiple domains. For PhishMe, I used a simple mail server with no email or spam filters running.
Once my PhishMe account was created, I received an email asking me to log in and create a password for the platform. I liked the fact that the password had to be 12 or more characters long and be complex. It's a little thing, but considering how often we write about the importance of strong and complex passwords on online services, a service posting stronger requirements than what is considered the norm (6-8 characters appear to be the most common requirement) is always welcome.
Prepping the Bait
PhishMe splits the simulations into "scenarios" and "tests." The only difference between the two seems to be that tests are not tracked by the reporting engine, but it's not clearly explained within the interface. The test may allow administrators to craft simulations and step through the steps without having the results affecting the overall reports, but again, its purpose is not made clear at the onset.
In order to create a scenario, I picked from 30-or-so available templates. The selection is slightly overwhelming, as they cover a whole range of situations, including the generic package delivery notification, a virus outbreak alert, and a security update warning. They are organized in one of the three categories: tricking victims into handing over data, containing malicious links, and attached with malicious files.
The focus is on the template, giving administrators the ability to launch a mix of tests. Considering that many organizations are targeted with scams pretending to be from social-networking sites, I was surprised this wasn't highlighted in the selection. However, administrators can create templates from scratch using the custom builder.
I also thought it would have been nice to see some attention paid to use case scenarios to give administrators feedback on which ones are specifically targeting professional settings. The list of templates were overwhelming as there weren't any sub-categories focusing on the phishing type. In a way, PhishMe felt a little complicated and better designed for an organization with a large IT department that could put in the time and effort to develop and tweak comprehensive training campaigns rather than a smaller one.
I went through the workflow, selecting the type of email template to use and customizing it, choosing and customizing the training material to display, and scheduling when the messages will be sent. After I customized the email, I had the option to send a "test" message to the administrator's account to verify it looked correct.
PhishMe differs from PhishGuru in how the interface is laid out. Wombat took a very compartmentalized approach with PhishGuru, with separate sections for managing recipients, viewing existing simulations, creating new campaigns, running reports. PhishMe puts all the functions into a single workflow: Email, Site, Education, and Schedule. For example, instead of creating lists of users who would receive the test messages in a separate "user" area of the site, PhishMe prompts administrators to create the list as part of selecting and customizing the message.
Under PhishMe, administrators can upload the recipient list using Excel or comma-delimited (csv) files. However, it doesn't allow the user to open an existing list and edit it to create a new one. I was a little surprised at how rudimentary user management was. If I upload a file and then later decide I want to use only a subset of the names, I have to re-upload a smaller list. If I edit that existing list, it overwrites the list entirely. It would have been nice to be able to modify lists, to be able to select existing recipients and group into other lists.
I selected a template, and found the editing tool allows for extensive customizations, including who it would be from, the subject line, and the actual contents of the message. After customizing the message, I could send myself a test. It took me a few seconds to do so, because I didn't realize I had to hit the + button to add a new field (which also saved the address I'd already entered) before the "send test message" button became active. This particular implementation felt surprisingly clunky in an otherwise snappy interface. | https://uk.pcmag.com/antiphishing/53485/phishme |
The shortage of cybersecurity workers poses a significant threat to our nation. It jeopardizes the safety and security of all Americans. Cybersecurity Ventures predicts a global shortage of 3.5 million cybersecurity professionals by 2021 — 300,000 of those in the U.S. alone.
What threat does this shortfall pose? Businesses and government agencies are vulnerable to data breaches, which can potentially cost hundreds of millions of dollars and impact millions of lives. When thinking about the increasingly widespread use of cloud-based and mobile computing and the Internet of Things, or IoT, it only makes sense that a lack of cybersecurity professionals puts our assets and information at risk of cyberattacks.
To prevent cyberattacks — which have increased globally as more people use online technology in their everyday lives — and protect information and assets, the cybersecurity industry needs trained people with the skills and understanding necessary to fill the gap.
Cybersecurity Education Today
Cybersecurity professionals can’t exist without quality cybersecurity education in their early years. Unfortunately, that education isn’t happening. One global study showed that only 23% of respondents believe education is properly preparing students to go into the field of cybersecurity.
But studies have shown that early engagement with cybersecurity education makes it more likely students will continue to pursue it with genuine interest through middle and high school. Students whose STEM education bridges between elementary school and beyond are more likely to major in STEM courses such as cybersecurity, engineering, or computer science when they attend college or tech school.
But what causes this gap in cybersecurity education? One reason is that strict budgets prevent many schools from investing in cybersecurity like they might want to. There is also a lack of relevant teacher training — and a lack of qualified cybersecurity teachers. Those same teachers are hesitant to apply technology in the classroom to educate students about cybersecurity, and this trend is only worsened by inadequate funding.
Cybersecurity should be embedded in all aspects of our education system. Just as math is part of science, engineering, and even art, and English is part of every course in school, cybersecurity can be integrated into curriculums to prevent the cybersecurity skills gap from growing.
The Biggest Challenges in Cybersecurity
A lack of training presents one of the most significant obstacles to closing the gap in the cybersecurity workforce. Part of this stems from inadequate funding, but it also goes back to a general lack of understanding of what it takes to give students a quality cybersecurity education.
In many schools, cybersecurity courses are electives. Most students go through K-12 without ever taking a single course in cybersecurity. Cybersecurity is often lumped together with other electives — such as music and art — but it should be a common core.
The internet is no longer novel; it’s part of almost everything we do. Just as every student has to take English, math, and history because they will need that knowledge in the future, they also should have to learn about cybersecurity. Arguably, it’s even more applicable, as it’s something we’ll use every day for the rest of our lives.
The challenge now is for schools to rethink their approach to teaching cybersecurity. Equally, it’s time for industry leaders to step up and take an active role in cybersecurity training to help increase the number of professionals entering the sector.
The cybersecurity skills gap is real. There are numerous unfilled cybersecurity jobs in both the public and private sectors — but especially in the former. Why is there a shortage of cybersecurity professionals in government agencies? Because civilian industries can offer employees far more pay. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, cybersecurity professionals in the public sector make nearly 27% less than their counterparts at private companies.
Government agencies are at the forefront of our cyber defense, so they have a critical need for expert workers. Many skills are needed for a cybersecurity expert, and many roles are important to cybersecurity work. Engineers, consultants, and analysts are all crucial parts of a well-built cyber defense workforce. Whether these workers are security software developers, malware analysts, or IT engineers, they all play a major role in protecting cyber assets.
Moving Beyond the ‘Typical Coder’
Many people think of the “typical coder” when they think of cybersecurity jobs and computer science. This notion of a reclusive coder in a hoodie is so pervasive that it clouds our vision about what the world of cybersecurity. It’s also a stereotype that can be combatted by taking a new approach to teaching cybersecurity.
By moving beyond the traditional way of teaching and switching to a more project-based approach, educators can challenge students to solve real problems that exist in their communities and the world at large. This tactic ensures learning is purposeful and engaging. It also gives students hands-on experience solving real-life problems and working as part of a team.
Cybersecurity is a field that welcomes people from diverse, nontraditional backgrounds who are curious and ready to learn. Whether it’s through a boot camp, community college, or degree program, cybersecurity training allows a wide array of people to become highly trained professionals.
The Consequences of a Shortage of Skilled Workers
The shortage of cybersecurity workers has serious consequences for companies in the U.S. Instead of recruiting cybersecurity professionals in the U.S., many companies are hiring outsourced workers from foreign nations. This is unacceptable. We have the necessary knowledge and resources to produce excellent cybersecurity professionals. This lack of skilled local cybersecurity professionals also means companies can’t effectively protect themselves from increasingly skilled hackers.
To combat this shortage, companies should create cybersecurity partnerships with educational institutions. This might involve forming or expanding internship and apprenticeship programs that invite students to experience cybersecurity and different cultures on-site while learning cybersecurity skills in real time.
Further, workers who teach students these skills on the job should have half of their salaries paid by school districts and the other half paid by their employers. This will save schools money by not having to hire a full-time teacher, and it will save companies money by having a portion of their employees’ salaries paid by schools. The result? An army of trained cyber professionals who are ready to work in the real world.
The Problem of Failing to Change Mindsets
There is massive attrition among cybersecurity workers as a result of the shortage of skilled professionals. This drives up salaries and leaves companies rushing to find professionals who can add value to their teams, even though some of them may not actually possess the skills to match their requested pay.
Numerous factors are influencing this high rate of attrition, but burnout and stress play big roles. Keeping up with constantly evolving security needs and data privacy responsibilities can cause employees to feel burned out. They have to learn and adapt as they go, carrying the bulk of the burden because companies don’t have enough professional help.
In the long term, the shortage of cybersecurity professionals will put companies in a compromised position. A failure to secure the people they need to build, maintain, and protect the data they’re responsible for will eventually have severe consequences.
There is no teaching certification for cybersecurity. Cybersecurity teachers might have STEM licenses, but they don’t usually have any formal training in cybersecurity. As a result, many educators are reluctant to teach these courses. Couple that with the fact that most trained cybersecurity professionals aren’t willing to take a pay cut to work as a teacher, and the result is an inability to make cybersecurity a core part of education.
Most colleges didn’t offer cybersecurity degrees until recent years, which means many educational institutions are still coming to understand the importance of cybersecurity and how it should fit into their curriculum. Only one of the top 36 computer science programs at colleges around the country requires a cybersecurity course, so it’s easy to see why graduates aren’t prepared to work as cybersecurity professionals — even after years in higher education.
When to Start Cybersecurity Education
We live in a world where children use computers long before they begin school. For that reason, cybersecurity education should begin the moment their schooling does. To survive in a world powered by computers, all people need to be cyber literate. To achieve this goal, schools must offer instruction on cybersecurity literacy from a young age.
Cybersecurity literacy starts with basic online safety skills, but it should also emphasize why it’s so important to protect information. These lessons should start as early as preschool, and this information should be reinforced throughout students’ time in grades K-12. By teaching cyber literacy as soon as children start using computers, we can create a more cyber-secure world.
The Resources Cybersecurity Educators Need
There is no shortage of cybersecurity learning resources. From free online courses offered by colleges to organizations like ours that offer cybersecurity classes and certifications, an array of resources exist to help people gain more knowledge about cybersecurity without a formal classroom setting.
That said, in-person classes do offer some advantages. Students in these environments can get constructive feedback and work in groups, giving them a level of collaboration and support they might not get working alone.
Students have access to plentiful cybersecurity learning resources, but educators can also tap into these resources. They can use the CyberPatriot website, for example, to build a cybersecurity curriculum and syllabus. Public libraries offer study books — helping students and teachers save money — and there is an abundance of material available for both beginner and high-level classes.
A Recommended Cybersecurity Education Path
In elementary school, students should take classes introducing them to cyber safety and malware, phishing, password protection, and personal information protection.
As they move into middle school, their courses should be year-round and dive more deeply into computers. For example, these courses might include Introduction to PC Applications, PLTW Computer Science Essentials, and Intro to Coding.
Finally, high school students can build their expertise with classes like Cybersecurity I and II, Computer Science Foundations, and work-based learning programs.
Making cybersecurity a core part of our education system requires a bridge in education from elementary to middle to high school. At each level, the bridge should connect the cybersecurity skills students develop to the skills they’ll learn in the future — and those they’ve learned in the past. Continuity is key, and cybersecurity education is no exception.
How can schools and educators achieve this coordination? They should start with data. Using K-12 education data to build curriculums for cybersecurity will show schools what works and what needs improvement.
This process will be dynamic, and changes will likely be necessary as time goes on. But when schools coordinate at all levels, they ensure the system develops an enduring infrastructure and creates a large pool of skilled students who go on to pursue cybersecurity careers.
The Need for Adequate Resources in Our Education Infrastructure
Addressing the cybersecurity skills shortage will require government institutions, local colleges, and private companies to come together and build programs like internships, summer camps, competitions, and educational gaming programs. These are only a few of the numerous activities that can help recruit students to cybersecurity career paths.
If schools don’t have the necessary resources to prepare students for cybersecurity education and training, we will struggle to address the severe shortage of cybersecurity professionals. Businesses that lack the adequate number of cybersecurity workers are falling behind in providing enough cybersecurity training, failing to use security tools as effectively as they could, and lacking in security oversight — all of which put their organizations at risk.
Without a sufficient number of cybersecurity professionals, our national cybersecurity infrastructure will suffer. Ultimately, our defenses against outside threats will be significantly weaker.
The Promising Future of Cybersecurity Jobs
Seemingly endless paths exist for graduates interested in filling the cybersecurity skills gap. High school graduates with a good foundation in cybersecurity training have the ability to go to college and pursue degrees in cybersecurity or computer science, both of which ensure a high probability of finding a job and entering the workforce.
But that’s not the only way to make a difference. For students who didn’t receive a strong cybersecurity education, certifications and experience training still offer a way to become cybersecurity professionals. At some point in their careers, however, they will probably want to get applicable degrees to give them a better chance of excelling in the workforce.
As threats to cybersecurity become a higher priority, careers in cybersecurity become more important and offer better compensation. Students interested in pursuing these careers will find the most success when they start learning about cybersecurity tools, threats, and advancements from the beginning of their learning years.
The best way to close the cybersecurity skills gap and end the shortage of cybersecurity professionals is through comprehensive collaboration between cybersecurity companies and educational institutions. These partnerships will prepare students for the workforce, combat the current lack of resources and teachers, and make cybersecurity courses a critical part of our education system. When we commit to making cybersecurity education a priority, we commit to building a secure future for generations to come. | https://cyber-center.org/how-to-shore-up-americas-cybersecurity-deficit/ |
[Oisf-devel] [COMMIT] OISF branch, master, updated. suricata-3.1-28-ged483b4 OISF Git [Oisf-devel] [COMMIT] suricata-3.1-30-g37b10c1 OISF Git [Oisf-devel] [COMMIT] suricata-3.1-31-g9d01ef5 OISF Git [Oisf-devel] [COMMIT] suricata-3.1-36-g2856dfd OISF Git [Oisf-devel] [COMMIT] [Oisf-devel] [COMMIT] OISF annotated tag, suricata-3.1.1, created. suricata-3.1.1 OISF Git | https://lists.openinfosecfoundation.org/pipermail/oisf-devel/2016-July/date.html |
It’s tax season again, the most wonderful time of the year for the US government, and taxpayer attitudes about identity theft are leaving much of the public vulnerable.
In its second annual Tax Season Risk Report, CyberScout, most Americans (58%) are not worried about tax fraud in spite of federal reports of 787,000 confirmed identity theft returns in 2016, totaling more than $4 billion in potential fraud.
Only 35% of taxpayers demand that their preparers use two-factor authentication, which is far more secure than a single password, to protect their clients’ personal information. The majority (56.5%) were not sure whether their preparer would follow this best practice, were not offered it or didn’t require it.
Also, half of all taxpayers (50%) who use a tax service weren’t sure how to evaluate them, chose someone online or didn’t screen them beforehand, leaving the taxpayer vulnerable to scams.
On the at-home front, less than a fifth (18%) use an encrypted USB drive, a secure way to save important documents like tax worksheets, W-2s, 1099s or 1040s. Another 38% either store tax documents on their computer’s hard drive or in the cloud, both approaches that are susceptible to a variety of hacks. And, the majority (51%) of taxpayers who expect a refund check in the mail have not taken precautions such as a locked mailbox, putting their check at risk of theft.
More than half (57%) of consumers will file in March, April or later than the April 15 deadline, giving tax fraudsters plenty of time to impersonate them online and steal their refunds.
“We’ve reached an extreme level of cybercrime where identity theft has become the third certainty in life. In tax season, it is crucial that everyone remain vigilant and on high alert to avoid tax related identity theft or phishing schemes,” said Adam Levin, founder and chairman of CyberScout, making a seasonal joke. “Tax season is one of the most common times for identity fraud to take place, making it even more important for consumers to take the proper safety measures.”
One of the safest ways for consumers to file their 2016 tax return is to file online directly with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Unfortunately, less than half of taxpayers (48%) rely on and trust online tax services. Nearly a quarter (24%) of respondents do not trust online tax services because they think they are unsafe, a misperception that can lead to exposure.
CyberScout recommends the following techniques for consumers to protect themselves:
Always use long and strong passwords.
Never authenticate yourself to anyone who contacts you online or by phone, since the IRS will never contact you by those methods.
Use direct deposit of refunds into your bank account or a locking mailbox for mailed refunds.
Monitor and protect your accounts and elements of your personal identity online and in social media. It’s easy for hackers to figure out answers to security questions from social media.
“In order to reduce the risk of becoming a tax identity theft victim, consumers need to follow the 3Ms: Minimize their risk of exposure, monitor your accounts and your personal identity, and know how to manage the damage,” noted Levin. “If the worst happens, victims of identity theft should turn to organizations they trust, including their insurance provider, financial services institution, or the HR department of their employer, who offer low-cost or free cyber-protection services to protect and restore stolen identities.” | https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/death-taxes-and-identity-theft/ |
If you work in an environment where the data on your device is so important that you want it to be protected any time you’re away from that computer, you may want to consider full-disk encryption. This is an encryption methodology that encrypts everything on the drive. It encrypts all of your documents. It encrypts all of the files. The operating system itself is encrypted. Nothing is left unturned. Everything on that drive is now protected with this encryption mechanism.
This is obviously perfect for mobile devices– devices that can easily be stolen, devices that may get out of your hands and into somebody else’s. And if you have the entire disk encrypted, you can feel very secure that even if somebody does gain access to the hardware, they’re still not going to gain access to any of your data.
Many of these encryption methods are built right into the operating system. Linux has a number of encryption options available. In Windows, you could use BitLocker. In OS X, you could use FileVault. And it makes it very easy because it’s part of the operating system itself. Of course, you can go outside of the operating system and get your encryption technology from a third party. For example, PGP has a full-disk encryption application. And up until recently, TrueCrypt was a very popular full-disk encryption option for Windows, and that project is now inactive.
With any of these encryption methods, the management of the keys is incredibly important. It is these certificates that are encrypting this data. So we want to be sure that we have a backup of that data. If that encryption key goes missing, or you lose it, or it’s damaged in any way, you will no longer have access to any of the data on the disk. So it’s always important if you’re using full-disk encryption, that you’ve also got a very good backup or you have at least copies of your key that you’re keeping other places.
If we’re keeping a large active store of data in a database, it might make sense to us to simply encrypt all of that data. But technologically speaking, it becomes very difficult to have all of that information stored in an encrypted form and still have a very good way to access that data in a timely manner. Encrypting data requires CPU overhead. There are calculations that have to be made. And if we’re retrieving and storing information very quickly– especially across a very large number of people to a very active database– it may not be practical to keep all of that information encrypted.
The ability to encrypt this data at the database level may be subject to the capabilities of the DBMS that you’re using, that is, the database management system. So there are some methods within Microsoft SQL Server. There are completely different encryption methods in MySQL. Those engines are very different, and as you go across different platforms, you’ll see that there are different encryption options, depending on what you’re using.
What many people will do is instead of encrypting the entire database, they’ll pick particular fields– especially fields that have very sensitive information– and will only encrypt that data. This way you’re able to retrieve and store information reasonably quickly, but still protect information that would be sensitive inside of that database. It’s very important if you do have a relational database, not to encrypt your key fields. These are the fields that will allow you to compare information when you’re comparing across individual databases. And it’s these indexes and these key fields that are very important to maintain in an unencrypted form.
If you don’t want to encrypt everything that’s on your drive– you don’t want to take advantage of full-disk encryption– but there are certain files that would be nice to store in an encrypted form on your drive, you might want to take advantage of some built-in capabilities of your operating system. Many operating systems allow you to right-mouse click on a file, choose to encrypt it, and that file would then stay encrypted on disk. That way, if somebody did come across your computer, they may be able to see some other spreadsheets and documents on your drive, but the ones that you’ve encrypted would obviously be protected.
There’s a number of third-party applications that can also do this, so you don’t have to rely on the operating system. You can rely on the encryption method that makes sense for you. This means of course, that some files on your drive will be encrypted, and other files will not. And you have to decide, then, exactly what data will be stored in an encrypted form on your drive.
Remember that encryption doesn’t come for free. There are CPU cycles that must be used to retrieve and store that data. There’s memory that has to be used to be able to perform that encryption process. For example, if you have a file on disk that is being accessed quite a bit, you might be losing response time and speed by encrypting that data. And then it’s up to you to decide if the decrease in performance will be made up by the security that’s going to be based on that encryption.
In all of these cases, again, you want to be sure that you protect the encryption keys that are used on this information. Even though it’s a single file, there’s still going to be an encryption key. And if you lose that encryption key, you will lose access to that encrypted data. So make sure you have backups, make sure that information is stored elsewhere, and make sure that key is something that you can then provide back onto the computer if it ever gets lost or damaged.
The security of the data stored on removable devices is the bane of the security administrator. And I can tell you personally that I’ve lost a number of USB keys through the years, and of course, wherever that USB key ends up, is where my data is now going to live. And it’s very important that the data, therefore, is protected on those removable devices. The security administrators and system administrators in your environment may set policies in the operating system that require that data that is stored on a removable device must be encrypted. And they can automate this process, so whenever you store data on that removable device, it will always be encrypted without any input from you. And this way, they can be assured that if that information is lost in some way, at least the data itself will not be accessible.
Again, key management is incredibly important. There is an encryption key, and that encryption key is what you use to retrieve that data. If you lose access to that key or that key is damaged, all of that information is no longer going to be accessible. It’s very common for network administrators and operating system administrators to automatically store your encryption keys in a central area. That way if you leave the organization, or your laptop goes missing, or you lose the key, they can then provide a key that’s going to gain access to that data.
And if your system administrator is very concerned about data on these removable devices, they might set policies that say that the USB is completely disabled on your systems. And in that way, you would not be able to plug in a USB drive or external hard drive and store any information on a removable device.
We’re all walking around with our mobile phones and our tablets, and these devices obviously have data stored on them that are also a concern of ours. We want to be sure that we’re encrypting that data, as well. Fortunately almost all the operating systems that you’ll run into on these mobile devices already implement some form of encryption of the data on that device. It may not be all of the data on that mobile device, but some of the most important and private information is encrypted by default.
Very often, it’s the key on this device that, of course, is going to encrypt all of that data. In fact, if somebody performs a wipe of data on these mobile devices, what they’re really doing is deleting the key. Once the key is deleted, none of the data on your device will then be accessible. If you’re using an iOS device like an iPhone or an iPad, then a lot of this data may already be encrypted, using something Apple calls Data Protection.
If you look into the configuration of your device and you’ve enabled a passcode, then you’ll have a note there that says Data Protection is enabled. This means that if your mobile device is stolen, they would have to have that pass code. If they don’t have the pass code, then they do not have access to the data. Not everything on your iOS device will be encrypted using this method. Things like SMS messages or pictures are not generally encrypted. So you can’t be assured that everything on the mobile device will be encrypted, just some of the most important information on the device.
If you’re running the Android operating system on a mobile device, there are encryption settings in the Settings and Security section. You even have the option for a full-disk encryption across that entire device. And the key, again, on these devices is built on the pass code itself. Regardless of the type of data you’re using, whether it’s on your desktop, whether it’s on removable storage, or on your mobile devices, encryption becomes extremely important and a very valuable way to protect your personal data. | https://www.professormesser.com/security-plus/sy0-401/data-encryption-2/ |
Pandemic and the subsequent lockdowns had a huge impact on our lives and changed the way we conduct business forever. According to 2021 IBM’s Cost of a Data Breach Report, data breach costs rose by 9% from USD 3.86 million to USD 4.24 million, the highest average total cost in the 17-year history of this report. Cyber security technologies continue to evolve but we have not been able to reduce costs incurred by businesses. It is time to go back to the drawing board and address the problem.
The issue is caused by many reasons such as new-gen technologies (Cloud, IoT), significant growth of remote workers, shortage of skilled resources, un-coordinated efforts towards cyber security. For us at ValueLabs, Cyber Security is not limited to reaching compliance levels. We believe cyber security efforts have to be comprehensive covering each aspect of your IT processes, right when you start designing your IT systems to the operating environment.
For us at ValueLabs, it starts with modeling your architecture to identify threats. Frameworks such as MITRE ATT&CK and STRIDE are deployed to ensure the architecture is resilient to the techniques used by advanced threat actors. Strong access management is a fundamental part of the architecture and our zero-trust approach has helped many of our customers. As enterprises move towards expanded perimeter on the Cloud, Cloud Access Security Brokers help deploy appropriate access controls.
Our agile development processes incorporate a fully automated security scanning stack to identify and contain security vulnerabilities on time. This scanning stack includes tools for static and dynamic analysis and covers traditional virtual machines and containers as well.
Our next-gen managed security operations center with exceptionally skilled cyber experts ensures human-led AI aided 24×7 threat protection. Threat intelligence along with automated incident management allows us to detect and respond to cyber incidents faster than ever driving continuous assurance for our customers. | https://www.valuelabs.com/blog/cyber-security/the-subtle-art-of-dealing-with-cyber-threats/ |
Certainly the paradigm of cyber-security based on the perimeter no longer exists in the age of always on, universal addressable communication, and new paradigm candidates are now competing to replace it.
Geer asserted that what drives the future is culture and science and combining both he kicked off by providing an academic outline of what make a paradigm and why and how they change. Heavily quoting Thomas Kuhn's book, The structure of scientific revolutions, Geer described how a science is defined by beliefs that are shared, that impenetrable jargon insulates science from society – and that when anomalies occur they need to be resolved, deferred or a new paradigm created that resolves them. Anomalies that can't be resolved within the existing paradigm put that paradigm in crisis from competing paradigms that better explain the anomalies. And like the dinosaurs, those who fail to adapt to a change in environment become extinct.
A major problem faced by any new paradigm will be authentication for authorisation, to be established prior to use, but one which had previously been solved in the paradigm of perimeter control, with components such as ‘defence in depth' being as old as the origin of cities.
Geer also suggested that because cyber-security has sentient opponents it is entirely different from all other sciences ‘of unsolved puzzles' such as economics, physics, chemistry etc as the truth it researches is not stable and so cannot simply be exhaustively explored. The unprecedented rate of change faced was described as the sum of technical advance and sentient opponents.
A second crisis for cyber-security is the size and growth of the attack surface: for example, the cores in central CPU are many- from 18 to 21 in a mobile phone CPU, so is that one perimeter or almost two dozen? And the rate of growth of connected Internet of things is currently put at 35 percent pa, so a doubling of the perimeter in 17 months.
Alternative paradigms include one of surveillance and accountability, focussed on what is observable, and that sensors show to be true. Authentication is described as a fork in the road as to what approach may be taken. One goal of authentication is that of a single un-spoofable identity that the individual doesn't need to prove – but that leaves the individual to either submit or withdraw from the system that can ‘unmask them in the street'.
But the current view in democracies is that there should be personal control of personal data, and that a person has free will to be able to selectively reveal oneself to the world – including the capacity to misrepresent yourself.
Geer suggests that a new authentication based on an accountability regime will not be interested in who you pretend to be, but what you did. It will reject the idea of providing specific permission for discreet chunks of information. Data traffic analysis is more powerful than content analysis – hence government assurances that it only keeps metadata – who you contacted, when and for how long, recorded in real time - relies on the ignorance of the public to not realise the actual content is only of archaeological interest.
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Your use of this website constitutes acceptance of Haymarket Media's Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions. | https://www.scmagazineuk.com/rsa-2015-time-for-a-paradigm-shift-in-cyber-security/article/537013/ |
GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) is a regulation in the European Union (EU) designed for privacy and data protection for individuals within the EU. Specifically, it regulates the exportation of data out of the EU so citizens have control over their data. It operates as a protection against business uses of data. The regulation will be enforceable in May 2018.
This type of regulation is important because of the increased emphasis on globalization in business. Since so much business is done online, it is easy for companies to work with customers and other companies all over the world. It can be tempting to use citizens’ data to the advantage of the company, such as selling personal information to third parties. Since the regulation protects data security, compliance is necessary for companies to do business in the EU.
The advantage of the regulation is that it provides one set of standards for all data usage. This standard set of regulations ensures that all businesses are using the same high-quality protocols to protect information. There are no questions about what protocols are used or whether or not organizations are following the regulation appropriately. This is useful for countries like the United States, who do business with multiple countries in the EU and must balance multiple sets of regulations.
However, the regulations are not only in place as a gesture to protect the people. Since they are government-implemented regulations, they are enforceable. As a result, companies not compliant with the security measures are subject to hefty fines and other potential consequences. These consequences ensure that citizens’ data is protected by all companies and not just those that opt to comply with the security measures.
HIPAA
HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) is legislation that protects the privacy of patients’ medical and personal information when used by healthcare facilities.
It is because of HIPAA that patients must provide permission for their records to be shared with other doctors. HIPAA has become even more important in recent years because more hospitals and clinics are using electronic health records to store patient information.
Even though HIPAA puts regulations in place for managing data security, there were numerous recent breaches of security. These breaches emphasize the need for compliance with security protocols.
A breach occurred at Henry Ford Health in October 2017, which led to the theft of data of more than 18,000 patients.
Within one year, the Augusta University Medical Center was hit twice by a phishing attack, even if the second attack breached only less than one percent of patients’ data.
In July 2017, more than 100,000 patients were impacted by a cyber attack. The cyber attack breached medical files, images, and patient details.
Pacific Alliance Medical Center, based in Los Angeles, was hit by a ransomware attack in June. This resulted in the breach of information of more than 250,000 patients.
Many more attacks occurred, breaching the data of millions of patients in the United States.
It is clear from these attacks that there is a need for greater security to protect patients’ data.
The purpose of HIPAA is protection. But the data breaches indicate that the regulations put in place to protect digital data may not be enough. The HITECH (Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health) Act is designed to promote the meaningful use of information technology in healthcare. This includes electronic health records. However, without the appropriate security protocols and compliant care providers, patient data is still vulnerable to breaches. Since technology is now integral to health care, it is likely that future developments will include stricter fines for violations of HIPAA.
As technology has advanced, there have been updates to the policies in order to more effectively protect cardholders’ data. For example, one way that companies have increased security in payment cards is the use of chips in the cards. This has been used in Europe for many years but is recent to the United States. The chips are more secure than the magnetic strips typically used, which protects against skimming at the transaction site.
It should be noted that federal law does not require business entities to be compliant with these policies. However, there are laws that refer to PCI DSS or measures similar to it, which suggests that it is beneficial for companies to comply with the policies.
Ultimately, the policies are designed to protect cardholder information. However, when businesses are compliant with the policies, they can be protected, as well. If a malicious user breaches security and accesses cardholder information, one of the first questions asked is whether the company was protecting against hackers. Adhering to the standards of PCI DSS shows that the company was doing what was necessary to protect cardholders. It may not absolve the company of all responsibility but shows that they were not negligent.
Without appropriate security, including regular updates, people’s data is vulnerable. Since technology is an essential part of society, security must be, too. Through widespread policies and protocols, businesses and other organizations can protect people’s information so that technology can continue to make life easier.
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Some of the laptops issued by the Department for Education (DfE) to support remote education for disadvantaged young people contain malicious software, according to the online forum EduGeek.
The issue was raised by staff at a Bradford-based school, who claimed that the devices dished out to vulnerable learners in response to the COVID-19 pandemic were contaminated by malware connected to Russian servers.
An email from Bradford Council to local school leaders, which has been shared on the forum, states: “We have been made aware of the following issue from a Bradford School. They have just received their final assignment of Windows laptops from the DfE. The laptops are Geo Geobooks 1E.
“Upon unboxing and preparing them it was discovered that a number of the laptops are infected with a self-propagating network worm (Gamarue.I). The network worm looks like it contacts Russian servers when active.”
The email goes on to explain that the malware was discovered in an infected file, which seemed to have been modified in December 2019 – not long after the device had been manufactured.
It is thought that the software installs spyware, which can gather data on browsing habits and, worryingly, personal information such as banking details.
The DfE is said to have launched an official investigation into the matter, with an official telling BBC News: “We are aware of an issue with a small number of devices. And we are investigating as an urgent priority to resolve the matter as soon as possible.
“DfE IT teams are in touch with those who have reported this issue,” they said, adding that they do not believe the issue to be “widespread”.
The laptops have been provided as part of a government initiative to lessen the impact of the digital divide in UK schools, and allow learning for vulnerable pupils to continue while school sites remain closed.
You might also like: National Grid donates 1,000 laptops to support home learning amid COVID-19
Education secretary Gavin Williamson recently announced an extension to the scheme, which now reportedly aims to provide an additional 300,000 children with devices.
Mr Williamson noted that this extension would see a further 1.3m young people receive devices by the end of the month.
In response to these findings, Brian Higgins, security specialist at Comparitech, has issued the following statement: “Whilst it is unclear where these particular laptops were sourced, it is absolutely vital that anyone seeking to source devices, whether they are bought using sponsorship or donated directly, be fully aware of the risk that they may contain dormant or active malicious software and research appropriate methods to make them safe before they are distributed to homes and families.
“The potential for malicious software to be used against recipients is not limited to the children for which the devices are intended, as access to the internet will no doubt be useful for other family and friends outside of school hours. I would highly recommend that anyone distributing devices include some information about online safety. The National Cyber Security Centre offer free advice on secure home working and the use of online conferencing services such as Zoom and Teams.
“If anyone is in doubt about the safety and security of devices provided for educational purposes, they should contact the Department for Education IT team for advice before distribution.” | https://edtechnology.co.uk/schools/government-laptops-given-to-disadvantaged-youth-found-to-contain-malware/ |
Potential vulnerabilities have been continually introduced into critical infrastructure over the past 30 years, as supervisory control and data acquisition networks have become interwoven with industrial control systems. From water treatment plants to automobile factories, the ICS/SCADA combination has facilitated increased automation, gathering of data from remote sites and more streamlined process management.
Going forward, these tangible benefits will only make ICS/SCADA more central to production around the world. In 2012, IMS Research estimated that the industrial automation market was worth almost $160 billion and predicted that it would balloon to more than $200 billion by 2015. Frost & Sullivan analysts looking at the same subject cited cloud computing, mobile devices and custom applications as key drivers of growth in this area.
Essentially, organizations have replaced manual workflows with ICS/SCADA, plus they are making some of these systems Internet-facing, which creates further openings for external attack. Notable examples of ICS/SCADA cybersecurity events include:
The 2010 sabotage of uranium enrichment centrifuges at a facility in Natanz, Iran by the Stuxnet worm, one of the most sophisticated pieces of malware in history. It was introduced through a thumb drive and was designed to reduce the life of infected equipment while sowing confusion as to the cause.
A 2008 train derailment in Lodz, Poland, initiated by a teenager using a modified TV remote control to manipulate track switching as a prank.
An attack on a water utility station in Springfield, Illinois in 2011, possibly by Russian hackers. At the time, LogRhythm vice president noted that such "attacks in cyberspace can result [in] physical damage," and likened the incident to Stuxnet and the related Duqu framework.
In a 2013 Trend Micro research paper, The SCADA That Didn't Cry Wolf, Kyle Wilhoit noted that while ICS/SCADA have been around seemingly forever, their security mechanisms have lagged their feature sets, despite the growing burden for ensuring safety on networked infrastructure. The prevailing approach to securing ICS/SCADA is still one of bolt-on half-measures and band-aids, rather than complete security.
How much risk do enterprises face in securing their critical infrastructure?
Understandably, enterprises – not to mention national governments – are becoming aware of infrastructure security issues. A July 2014 Ponemon Institute survey of 599 security executives found that 57 percent of respondents believed that their ICS/SCADA implementations were vulnerable to attack. Governments in countries from the U.S. to Japan have also introduced institutions to oversee and shore up these environments.
However, organizations, especially in the private sector, have been slow to upgrade network security and patch lCS/SCADA, despite widespread realization of the associated risks. Slightly less than 30 percent of security practitioners included in the survey reported that cybersecurity was a top priority for their firms. Teams may be holding back out of fear that introducing new solutions could compromise the performance and cost-effectiveness of legacy systems, which were designed to last for decades and as such are often out of step with current security practices.
In this context, the lack of an event that lives up to the hyperbolic "digital Pearl Harbor" name – despite the ramifications of Stuxnet and its ilk – may be incubating complacency, leading stakeholders to put off upgrades until something truly damaging affects their interests. Commenting on the Trend Micro TrendLabs Q1 2014 Security Roundup, JD Sherry, vice president of technology and solutions at Trend Micro, listed critical infrastructure as one of many sectors struggling to fend off targeted attacks. Slowness to act has been compounded by increasingly advanced schemes.
"Organizations continued to struggle with attacks that were targeted in nature, which could be directly aimed at the energy, financial, healthcare, and retail industries or critical infrastructure," stated Sherry. "It came down to a simple equation – high-value targets that promised massive payouts were compromised despite the determined efforts of organizations to protect their valuable information."
Cloud security, encryption and data classification all key to protecting critical infrastructure
Shielding critical infrastructure from harm is a leading cybersecurity issue, with implications for both the public and private sector. In a keynote at the Cloud Security Alliance Summit earlier this year, Sherry looked at how broad uptake of cloud computing services was posing new risks to ICS/SCADA security while simultaneously creating prime opportunities for more proactive and effective defense.
Blanketly restricting usage of the cloud is becoming unfeasible. However, enterprises that are smart about how they manage cloud and on-premises systems can reap the benefits of a secure, scalable infrastructure:
Data classification plans can determine what information passes through ICS/SCADA and what priority it deserves. Accordingly, organizations can better understand where to focus their security efforts and what risks they run.
Building off that, specific measures like encryption can be implemented to protect sensitive assets. Since it may not be economical to encrypt everything, having priorities can save the firm money while improving its security posture.
Not all cloud ecosystems are created equal. Enterprises may invest in someone else's hosted infrastructure (public cloud), build a scalable internal system (private cloud) or mix and match them (hybrid cloud). During procurement, it is imperative to ensure that the cloud service provider is diligent about security and spells out associated responsibilities in the contract.
On top of that, a combination of well-honed tactics such as application whitelisting and strategies like following the guidance of the National Institute of Standards and Technology can help organizations mitigate risks to critical infrastructure. The "digital Pearl Harbor" lingo may not go away anytime soon, but enterprises can ensure that they're well prepared in any event. | http://blog.trendmicro.com/breaking-down-old-and-new-threats-to-critical-infrastructure/ |
Neighbors' networks will appear when you pick your access point. Ignore those, and double-click your hardware.
Wireless PC clients often include configuration software from the Wi-Fi hardware company as well as the Windows Control Panel app. You can connect clients with either program, but I'll focus on the built-in Windows tool. Just make sure that you look through the extra software for an option to let Windows control the network settings.
Each networking component has its own MAC address; ignore the wired ethernet address.
An optional additional layer of wireless security known as "address filtering" checks connected devices against your own list of approved items; then, even if someone has your network password, the router won't let unapproved hardware gain access to the network. The list relies on the unique MAC (media access control) address assigned to each piece of hardware at the factory. Like the other layers of security, this one isn't impregnable. Theoretically, hackers could change their MAC address to match one of your friendly IDs, if they knew what it was. But such an attack is pretty unlikely to succeed (or occur), especially when you combine MAC address filtering with the previous security steps.
Address filtering does introduce an extra step to the process of connecting new devices to your network, but in return you get a little more peace of mind. Don't imagine that address filtering is equivalent to encryption, however: It doesn't prevent interlopers from intercepting your transmissions as WPA2 does.
To get started, connect all of your wireless clients to the network, using your WPA2 password. Remember to include PCs, smart phones, wireless game systems, media-streaming hardware, and other linked devices.
Revisit the configuration page for your wireless router, and enter your administrative password to log in. Look for an option to configure MAC address filtering (sometimes called "network filtering"), most likely inside the router's wireless settings area. Enable the filter, and set it so that it permits only identified MAC addresses to gain access to the network. Many routers have a button that shows all connected devices and lets you add them automatically. If not, before you enable the filter, copy the MAC address form the DHCP client table; it is often listed there under a Status (or Wireless Status) heading. Save the changes and wait for the router to restart if necessary.
In the future, you'll have to type the MAC addresses for any new device you wish to add to your network. You can quickly look up a laptop's MAC address by clicking Start, Run, typing cmd and pressing OK. Then type ipconfig /all and press Enter. Look for the set of six pairs of numbers and letters in the ethernet adapter Wireless Network Configuration area.
Firewall Security
The network's main firewall precaution filters out anonymous Internet requests that you didn't initiate.
Your router likely includes a firewall consisting of two parts: network address translation (NAT) and stateful packet inspection (SPI). In most instances, NAT is turned on by default. This method of routing lets Internet traffic connect to the router with a single, external IP address; the router controls which internal computers send and receive information. SPI takes this a step further, ensuring that incoming data is arriving in response to requests from your internal PCs. Turn on the SPI firewall in your router's configuration page (most likely under a security tab). With SPI enabled, the router will ignore traffic that you didn't request.
Sometimes, these settings block traffic--such as a game or other application--that you want. If you're having trouble with certain programs, change the port-forwarding settings. Essentially, this amounts to adding the external port for a program that the router is blocking, and entering the internal IP address for that PC. (Many common port numbers can be found online.) | https://www.pcworld.com/article/161100/wireless_network_setup.html?page=3 |
A good on the net antivirus assessment will help you decide which software to acquire. However , you must be cautious as there are several fraudulent sites out there that may steal your own personal data. An established website will certainly feature reviews simply by people who have applied a variety of anti-malware applications and can give you an honest assessment. Follow this advice to follow the moment selecting the best ant-virus for your PC.
One of the most important features to find in an on line antivirus program is a detailed password supervisor. This will make sure your reliability and prevent you from the loss of passwords. Besides being able to keep in mind passwords, username and password managers currently have other functions that will help you preserve yourself internet. For example , password managers are able to keep your accounts safe and protect you from id theft. Another important feature of your online ant-virus is that it will also look for software revisions, which is necessary for protecting your computer.
Most via the internet antivirus services require you to create an account to work with their expertise. This account will provide you with a great way to change www.webhosting-reviews.biz/how-to-remove-avast-secure-browser/ your products, set your privacy settings, and receive merchandise notices. Many of these programs will in addition allow you to register more than one computer system to receive information and facts about your computer’s security. | https://www.loods360.nl/what-you-should-expect-in-an-online-antivirus-review/ |
The year 2016 has been quite successful for Bitcoin ransomware developers so far. After crippling two major hospital systems in quick succession, it was a matter of time until new guidelines would be established. The Healthcare Insurance Portability and Accountability Act was created to address these malware threats.
The vast majority of healthcare organizations is clueless when it comes to understanding and preventing ransomware attacks. This new guideline by the US Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights should provide additional information on how this malware works. More importantly, it will also help institutions understand how they can spot a threat, and ensure no [significant] damage is done.
Preventing ransomware attacks from happening should be the top priority for every healthcare institution right now. Unfortunately, their limited budgets and less-than-stellar IT staff make that task a lot harder than need be. Providing guidelines is a good way to tackle this situation, albeit it may not yield the desired effect in the long run.
Training hospital staffers to spot a malware threat sounds great on paper, but it’s hard to achieve in real life. Most of the people working at a hospital are already overworked, and the last thing they need is more things on their plate. Limiting user access to account records is another option worth exploring, but it might create friction. If not everyone can access the document correctly, waiting for someone to come by with file access will only slow operations down.
One of the only ways to properly deal with a ransomware attack is by making regular system backups. The HIPAA guidelines touch upon this subject as well, as regular data backups are advised. Developing new security incident procedures, as well as reporting processes, are direly needed.
“Implementing a data backup plan is a Security Rule requirement for HIPAA covered entities and business associates as part of maintaining an overall contingency plan. Additional activities that must be included as part of an entity’s contingency plan include: disaster recovery planning, emergency operations planning, analyzing the criticality of applications and data to ensure all necessary applications and data are accounted for, and periodic testing of contingency plans to ensure organizational readiness to execute such plans and provide confidence they will be effective.”
In the end, technology is not to blame for successful malware attacks. Every single incident stems forth from a human error at some point, allowing malware to be installed on a host computer. It is also doubtful guidelines will do much unless they are actively enforced upon all employees. Ransomware takes advantage of vulnerable people, and no directives in the world will be able to solve that problem. | https://bitcoinschannel.com/hhs-issues-new-ransomware-guidelines-for-healthcare-sector/ |
Update on Rape charge on Rapper, Nell…
Cognitio has contributed to cybersecurity assessments on both side of M&A transactions. We have helped acquiring firms better understand the digital risks and security posture faced by the firm they are going to acquire, and we have helped firms that want to be in a better position to be acquired ensure they have taken prudent steps to reduce their digital risks.
If you are on the buy side of an M&A deal, you will want to make sure your cybersecurity due diligence delivers the information you need. This includes:
Whether you are on the buy side or the sell side of an acquisition, we recommend you start with a cybersecurity assessment to cover all aspects of cybersecurity people, process and technology. For more on this type of assessment, see the Cognitio Cyber360.
This post first appeared on CTOvision.com - Context For The CTO, CIO, CISO And, please read the originial post: here | https://www.blogarama.com/technology-blogs/132237-ctovisioncom-context-for-cto-cio-ciso-blog/19684551-cybersecurity-due-diligence-now-best-practice-merger-acquisition |
Seagate is moving away from its GoFlex branding with a new series of external drives dubbed Backup Plus, which will store not only your photos, videos and files, but some social media data as well -- users can back up or share documents to Facebook and photo-sharing site Flickr. And as far as I know, it is also the only single hard drive backup device that offers an uber-fast Thunderbolt connectivity option.
The Backup Plus line comes in a desktop model and a portable model; I tested the latter.
Lightweight and adaptable
The new Backup Plus portable drive is remarkably slim and light, weighing a little less than half a pound and measuring just .57-in. thick. It's 3.19 in. wide and 4.86 in. long. It comes in one of four colors: black, red, blue or silver.
Like its predecessor, the GoFlex, the Backup Plus portable line comes with a Universal Storage Module -- a removable SATA interface adapter. The drive comes standard with a USB 3.0 adapter snapped in, but that can be removed with a quick tug and replaced with a FireWire 800 or Thunderbolt adapter -- if you're willing to part with some additional greenbacks. The Thunderbolt adapter will run you $99. The FireWire adapter for the Backup Plus won't be available until the fall, but you can still use the GoFlex model of the adapter with this drive; it just won't match new drive's look. That sells for $24.99.
The Seagate Backup Plus portable drive with the Universal Storage Module interface adapter removed.
One of the nice features of Thunderbolt is the ability to daisy chain up to five devices. Unfortunately, if you have other Thunderbolt-enabled devices, Seagate's Backup Plus portable model will have to be at the end of the chain -- it's got no Thunderbolt output port. On the other hand, the desktop model has two Thunderbolt ports, so it can be used as a "pass-through" device.
I had problems with my adapter, which had a loose connection to the drive's SATA interface. This caused the I/O interface to my computer to disengage more than once with little more than a slight movement of the USB cable. I'm not sure if that's a design flaw or a manufacturing glitch with my unit.
SeagatePrice: $119.99 (500GB), $129.99 (750GB), $139.99 (1TB)Pros: Easy to use; performs well; offers several interfacesCons: Difficult setup; loose connector in review unit
In the minus column, however, the setup is a bit kludgy. It took a couple attempts to get the drive to set up so that I could use its Protect data backup tool and dashboard menu. A colleague of mine had similar problems getting his Backup Plus Portable drive to save his Facebook data properly; after a couple of calls to the support folks at Seagate, he got the drive to work.
I tested the Backup Plus using a MacBook Pro. The drive's software auto-detected my OS (Mac OS X version 10.6.8, a.k.a. Snow Leopard) and asked if I wanted to use the drive with Mac and PC or Mac only. Choosing both operating systems required installation of the included Paragon NTFS for Mac driver to enable two-way Mac OS and Windows use. Some applications, including Time Machine and the included Mac backup software from Seagate, will not work since they cannot make use of a drive that uses the Windows (NTFS) file system.
Choosing "Mac only" will erase PC-related functions on the drive and prepare it for use with all your Mac applications, including Time Machine and the included Mac backup software from Seagate.
Driving with a Dashboard
Seagate's Dashboard software, which comes with the drive, takes up 3GB of space on your computer. It's a small price to pay for a convenient way to access automated backup functions.
The Dashboard gives you three options: Protect (the backup application), Share (which lets you upload videos and photos to your Facebook, YouTube and/or Flickr accounts) and Save (which lets you download your photos from Facebook and Flickr).
Unfortunately, Seagate's Protect backup tool is only for PCs. Mac users are relegated to using Apple's Time Machine backup, but you can still use the "Save" or "Share" features, so your Facebook or Flickr files are incorporated into the Time Machine backup.
With the Protect tool, you also get a one-year free subscription to Seagate's public cloud service. The free cloud storage subscription includes up to 4GB capacity. You can optionally upgrade your online storage capacity to 10GB ($19.99/year), 25GB ($49.99/year) or 50GB ($99.99/year).
The Backup Plus portable drive's Dashboard helps you save or share social media content.
Using Protect
The default (and simplest) setting of the Protect data backup tools is "Protect Now." It finds the drive, creates a backup of all non-system data, such as photos and documents, and then continuously backs up any new data saved to your computer. You can also save content from your Facebook and/or Flickr accounts into a folder called MyOnlineDocuments.
Another cool feature allows you to pause or delete the backup in progress. You choose the time or day of the week you want to back up. Otherwise, backups will be continuous.
You can also choose to back up all data files or just files in your personal documents folder, your music, photos or videos. You can select specific files by selecting "select files" and clicking on file names, and can choose to back them up either on the drive and/or on Seagate Cloud Storage. You can then choose to back them up monthly, weekly, daily, hourly or continuously.
Once I did get it set up, the tools and menu appeared well thought out and simple to use. For example, my Facebook photos and videos were saved in a folder marked "Facebook," which I found easy to locate and useful in ensuring my social networking documents remain intact. (Often, once I upload a photo to Facebook, I end up deleting it off my phone or camera to open up space on the memory card.)
I like the fact that the Protect tool also includes a Snapshot option, which gives you greater manual control over backups. A snapshot is an exact copy of all system data at a particular point in time, which avoids the slowdown of a full backup, which pauses applications as it records new writes. Snapshotting is a relatively advanced feature that only business class systems typically have -- it's great for making a quick copy of everything up to that point in time. By compiling snapshots over time, you can maintain a full backup because you're adding the new data to the old for a complete picture.
To retrieve files you've backed up, you just click on the "restore files" button, which brings you to a screen where you can select files or folders you want to restore. The default is to restore them to their original locations, but you can also send them to different folders.
Make time for the first backup
As I expected, using a USB 2.0 cable, the initial backup took quite a while: roughly 3 hours and 45 minutes to back up 77.69GB of data. As a result, it's best to perform your first backup overnight, as it will likely slow down other application's performance.
It's a safe bet that using Thunderbolt or FireWire 800 will give users a remarkable boost in performance. I've reviewed Thunderbolt drives before, and full backups were markedly faster.
In summary
Overall, I found myself really liking this little backup drive. Its automated features are pretty advanced for such a small, single-drive device.
I was particularly impressed with the ability to set up specific backup times not just for data snapshots and full backups, but also being able to choose specific folders to back up regularly --such as photos or contacts.
I also like the size of this drive. It fits nicely into your jean pocket.
There were a few problems along the way. Seagate should do a little work on its setup, and users should make sure they get a secure fit with the adapter.
That being said, I'd recommend this drive for several reasons. Notwithstanding the speed of the initial backup -- it's always going to be slow unless you're using FireWire or Thunderbolt -- this drive works like a pro, backing up any new data and creating a full backup from that data. It's easy to use and it offers several interfaces through the use of adapters.
The price is right too. A 500GB model retails for $119.99, a 750GB model is $129.99 and a 1TB model, like the one I tested, retails for $139.99. The desktop version is available in 1TB ($129.99), 2TB ($159.99), 3TB ($179.99) and 4TB ($249.99) models.
Bottom line
Seagate knows hard drives, and it has done a nice job making an easy-to-use portable helpmate with this one.
Lucas Mearian covers storage, disaster recovery and business continuity, financial services infrastructure and health care IT for Computerworld. Follow Lucas on Twitter at @lucasmearian or subscribe to Lucas's RSS feed. His e-mail address is [email protected].
$3.8M funding round sees Sydney IBM partner boost global play
Aussie AWS partner wraps up $2.7M beacon tech rollout in France | https://www.cio.com.au/article/429618/seagate_backup_plus_review_save_your_social_media_data/ |
1. Go to Chrome Settings and locate ‘Privacy’. Click on Clear browsing data.
2. Navigate to ‘Search’ options and click on Manage Search Engines. Make sure that your default is Google and remove any other entries.
3. Browse to ‘On Startup’ then click on Set Pages under ‘Open a specific page or set of pages.’ Make sure that it is set to google.com and no more other entries are present. | https://forum.precisesecurity.com/computer-security/mystart-incredibar-removal-help |
The moment we’ve all been waiting for is finally here. The Center for Internet Security (CIS) officially launched CIS Critical Security Controls (CIS Controls) v8, which was enhanced to keep up with evolving technology (modern systems and software), evolving threats, and even the evolving workplace. The pandemic changed a lot of things, and it also prompted changes in the CIS Controls.
The newest version of the Controls now includes cloud and mobile technologies. There’s even a new CIS Control: Service Provider Management, that provides guidance on how enterprises can manage their cloud services.
Task-Based Focus Regardless of Who’s Executing the Control
Since networks are basically borderless — meaning there is no longer an enclosed, centralized network where all the endpoints reside — the Controls are now organized by activity vs. how things are managed.
Efforts to streamline the Controls and organize them by activity resulted in fewer Controls and fewer Safeguards (formerly Sub-Controls). There are now 18 top-level Controls and 153 Safeguards dispersed amongst the three Implementation Groups (IGs).
You read that right; there are no longer 20 CIS Controls. Apparently, 18 is the new 20!
IG1 = Basic Cyber Hygiene
CIS Controls v8 officially defines IG1 as basic cyber hygiene and represents an emerging minimum standard of information security for all enterprises. IG1 (56 Safeguards) is a foundational set of cyber defense Safeguards that every enterprise should apply to guard against the most prevalent attacks. IG2 (an additional 74 Safeguards) and IG3 (an additional 23 Safeguards) build upon previous IGs, with IG1 being the on-ramp to the Controls and IG3 including all the Safeguards for a total of 153.
The recently released 2021 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR) mentioned CIS Controls v8 by name, calling out the implementation groups. Through a combination of mappings to Verizon’s revamped incident classification patterns, IGs, and security functions of the CIS Controls, they identified a core set of Controls that every enterprise should implement regardless of size and budget:
Community Defense Model (CDM) – data-driven, rigorous, transparent approach that helps prioritize the Controls based on the evolving threat; CDM v1.0 utilized the 2019 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR) to determine top attacks and the MITRE ATT&CK (Adversarial Tactics, Techniques, and Common Knowledge) Framework v6.3
CDM v2.0 – Maps Safeguards as mitigations down to the ATT&CK Technique and Sub-Technique level (MITRE ATT&CK Framework v8.2), uses well-known industry threat reporting to determine the top attack types
CIS Controls v8 and some of these tools and resources are available today! As additional resources are updated, they’ll be added to the v8 page, so be sure to watch that space.
Just as technology and the threat landscape evolved, so did the CIS Controls. v8 is the direct representation of adaptability, simplification, and consistency that you’ve come to expect from the CIS Controls. | https://www.cisecurity.org/insights/blog/18-is-the-new-20-cis-controls-v8-is-here?wvideo=ks7xuf1109 |
µtorrent version Stable (3.4.5 build 41712) Blocked to internet by Norton Internet Security µtorrent version Stable (3.4.5 build 41712) Blocked to internet by Norton Internet Security
OpenCandy is Adware - during uTorrent's installation process, you may be offered numerous unwanted programs via the uTorrent installer.
Norton blocks this menace which is OpenCandy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenCandy
It's less hassle and much quicker to overwrite the old uTorrent.exe with the latest downloaded version. (Find the location where uTorrent.exe resides and put the new version in that folder. Make sure uTorrent is exited before overwriting). Launch uTorrent. Job done.
Anyone who insists on running uTorrent.exe after download to install, then temporarily disable your anti-virus or other software that may block it and disconnect from the internet before running the uTorrent.exe installer. | https://forum.utorrent.com/topic/101651-%C2%B5torrent-version-stable-345-build-41712-blocked-to-internet-by-norton-internet-security/ |
The CEO of an ETF firm shared his four favorite metaverse and cybersecurity "category killers."
Michael Loukas described category killers as hypergrowth stocks that could become the next FAANGs.
He prefers Unity and Roblox for the metaverse and CrowdStrike and Zscaler for cybersecurity.
The so-called FAANG stocks — which consist of Meta, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Alphabet — represent the world's most prominent and powerful technology firms.
Between 2009 and the end of 2021, the S&P 500 has gained 663% — during that same period shares of Alphabet have risen 1,400%, Apple returned 5,310%, Amazon gained 5,500%, and Netflix has risen an eye-popping 10,390%. Meta went public in May 2012, and since then shares are up 801%.
"The FAANG stocks were hypergrowth secular trends 15 years ago. Today they're some of the largest companies on the planet," said Michael Loukas, the principal and CEO of the exchange-traded-fund firm TrueMark Investments. "Who doesn't look at FAANG and wish they bought every single one of these 20 years ago?"
But this year, FAANG's are finding far less success.
Netflix shares rose 63% between March 2020 and December 2021 as people living under lockdown turned to the streaming service for entertainment — but after a disastrous earnings report late last month revealed susbcriber growth has slowed, shares of Netflix are down over 34% in 2022.
Facebook, now Meta, has also been on a rollercoaster ride over the last three years. While shares rose over 70% between March 2020 and the end of 2021, the stock has plummeted over 33% year-to-date after its own terrible earnings results.
While it's too late to capitalize on the colossal gains of the five FAANG names, as some of the biggest tech stocks in the world begin to lose steam it may be time for investors to look elsewhere for blockbuster games. Luckily, Loukas has identified four metaverse and cybersecurity stocks he believes will one day reign as "category killers."
Loukas defines category killers as firms that are "thriving" in a hypergrowth phase and have the potential to become the dominant players within their respective segments. He said that to determine the growth of these typically early-stage companies, he prefers to examine more "fundamental" metrics like customer adoption rather than earnings, since software companies' revenues are "essentially generated by customer acquisition."
Metaverse: Buy Roblox and Unity Software
Among the metaverse contenders, Loukas' favorite names are the video-game software developer Unity Software and the gaming platform Roblox, based on their robust core businesses, domination of the gaming market, and good fit between the metaverse angle and their existing technologies and value propositions.
"Unity really has industry-leading technology when it comes to building digital infrastructure and creating interactive, real-time 3D content for gaming," Loukas said. He added that this kind of cutting-edge technology gives Unity a huge advantage over competitors because of how instrumental it is in creating the metaverse's infrastructure and building hyperrealistic digital environments.
Loukas said that beyond these use cases, Unity's technology and "other verticals in architecture, construction, medicine" would allow it to participate in burgeoning industries like NFT development.
"Unity is a beast when it comes to anything that can benefit from AR and VR and real-time 3D," he said. "So think about all the applications for that."
On the other hand, Roblox enlists existing technology in its platform, Loukas said. But even though the technology may not be as advanced, it's "stackable," Loukas said, in that it allows its younger audience of almost 50 million daily users to build their own interactive and immersive worlds, which "coincides really well with what the metaverse is meant to do."You've got a whole generation of users that are already familiar with and comfortable with Roblox technology, so Roblox has a distinct advantage," Loukas said. "The metaverse becomes just another opportunity for expansion for these companies that were already growing at such a rapid pace and growing into different verticals."
With the metaverse as a catalyst, many companies would benefit, Loukas said, with notable peers including Activision Blizzard and Epic Games, the company behind "Fortnite."But for us, the category killers end up being the companies that not only benefit but have a core business outside of this," he said. While Unity has differentiated itself with its many verticals and industry dominance, Roblox has a head start in monopolizing the "child user space," he said.
"They'll continue to dominate the way they have for years in different segments, and the metaverse will expand the runway and the potential marketplace in which they can continue to grow," Loukas said.
Cybersecurity: Buy CrowdStrike and Zscaler
For cybersecurity stocks, Loukas listed CrowdStrike and Zscaler as his two favorites.
"Similar to what happened with Unity and Roblox, these companies were there growing, building a client base successfully, and then the pandemic hit," he said. When work-from-home initiatives skyrocketed in March 2020, the cybersecurity industry began garnering more attention, he said.
"Cybersecurity was always increasing in importance, but you have these macro events that draw the attention to a secular trend that already exists," Loukas said. "It's an established trend that's perfectly connected to the idea of the irreversible global digitalization — we're not going back."
Loukas said CrowdStrike and Zscaler are both "very effective at what they do" but work from two different angles: While CrowdStrike works on the "periphery of the cloud," Zscaler, a cloud-based cybersecurity company, works at the "core."They're very different types of cybersecurity, and both are effective," he concluded.
Sign up for notifications from Insider! Stay up to date with what you want to know. | https://www.businessinsider.com/best-stocks-to-buy-now-investing-strategy-metaverse-cybersecurity-roblox-2022-1?nr_email_referer=1&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Business_Insider_select&pt=385758&ct=Sailthru_BI_Newsletters&mt=8&utm_campaign=Insider%20Select%202022-01-12&utm_term=INSIDER%20SELECT%20-%20ENGAGED%2C%20ACTIVE%2C%20PASSIVE%2C%20DISENGAGED%2C%20NEW |
CSIT's Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) PhD program is for four years and comprises a taught element in the first year involving six modules over two semesters (alternatively students can opt not to do the taught component and do a traditional 3 year PhD). Students will then embark on their PhD in Cyber Security research project for the reminder of the four year period. At the end of Year 2, or 3, students will be afforded the opportunity to undertake an internship, either in the UK or abroad, with one of CSIT’s many industrial, academic or government partners in order to broaden their wider expertise. CSIT CDT programme will also include a placement at CSIT labs in year four, with a focus on developing commercially viable business ideas.
As part of the PhD programme, students will be trained in the NABC methodology by CSIT’s own in-house commercialisation staff. In addition, they will experience CSIT labs, either by supporting candidate IP development, or proposing IP developed during their own PhD, and if selected gaining the significant impact of that programme. This is a genuinely innovative and exciting component of our PhD programme. | http://www.qub.ac.uk/sites/CSIT/PhD-in-Cyber-Security-Centre-for-Doctoral-Training/ |
by Niels Ferguson, Bruce Schneier | Size: 2.4 MB
The ultimate guide to cryptography, updated from an author team of the world’s top cryptography experts.
Cryptography is vital to keeping information safe, in an era when the formula to do so becomes more and more challenging. Written by a team of world-renowned cryptography experts, this essential guide is the definitive introduction to all major areas of cryptography: message security, key negotiation, and key management. You’ll learn how to think like a cryptographer. You’ll discover techniques for building cryptography into products from the start and you’ll examine the many technical changes in the field.
After a basic overview of cryptography and what it means today, this indispensable resource covers such topics as block ciphers, block modes, hash functions, encryption modes, message authentication codes, implementation issues, negotiation protocols, and more. Helpful examples and hands-on exercises enhance your understanding of the multi-faceted field of cryptography. | https://freeeducationweb.com/cryptography-engineering-design-principles-and-practical-applications/ |
A few weeks ago, in my commentary "We Are the Weakest Link," (http://www.windowsitpro.com/WindowsSecurity/Article/ArticleID/94952/WindowsSecurity_94952.html ), I discussed the fact that human-engineering attacks have remained surprisingly effective, while various forms of electronic attacks have come and gone over the years. A few recent events reminded me that these types of attacks--which typically use email messages (including phishing attacks) and malicious Web sites to fool innocent users into coughing up personal and private corporate data--aren't the only major nontraditional (i.e., not completely electronic) problems facing IT pros today. So this week, I present two nontraditional issues: One is a financial matter, and the other is a security concern.
If you've worked in IT for any amount of time, it probably doesn't come as a surprise to hear that the cost of running and, perhaps more important, cooling data centers is astronomical and rising all the time. However, you might be surprised to discover how bad it's gotten. According to a recent study conducted by Stanford University and commissioned by processor maker AMD, energy consumed by data centers doubled between 2000 and 2005. The costs include electric, cooling, and other infrastructure expenses.
Most of the reason for the jump in costs--about 90 percent--is due to a growing number of inexpensive, low-end servers that went online during that time period. But clearly, low cost in this context applies only to the original purchase price. To put the actual cost in perspective, consider these numbers from the study: The total energy consumption bill for US-based data centers was $1.3 billion in 2000. But it jumped to $2.7 billion in 2005. Worldwide, the numbers jumped from $3.2 billion to $7.2 billion during the same time period.
Not surprisingly, many enterprises and other businesses are looking into or already implementing server consolidation strategies, virtualization solutions, and other ways to combat a glut of physical servers. Buying more efficient hardware also helps, and--surprise, surprise--survey commissioner AMD just released a more efficient line of corporate-oriented processors. But processors aren't the only energy sink in a typical server: Many older servers have incredibly inefficient power supplies as well.
In "We Are the Weakest Link," it turns out I inadvertently overlooked a major issue in many data centers and other secure environments, though even here, the line of attack is coming from an unexpected quarter: Smoking isn't just dangerous to your health. It could be dangerous for your enterprise as well. Penetration tests from NTA Monitor in the UK show that smokers who routinely go outside corporate buildings open up their employers to physical theft and on-site electronic attacks, because their entry and exit points are often unlocked and unguarded.
This is problematic because once an intruder gains physical access to your infrastructure, the available methods of attack become greater and simpler to implement. So although companies have reacted to emerging laws and social pressures to force smokers outside, the trend might ultimately hurt companies in other ways due to lax physical security. It's something to look into, certainly. | http://www.itprotoday.com/security/looking-nontraditional-infrastructure-holes |
Accenture has agreed to acquire Symantec’s Cyber Security Services business from Broadcom. Financial terms were not disclosed. The acquisition will make Accenture Security a major provider of managed security services, by increasing its ability to help companies anticipate, detect and respond to cyber threats.
Symantec’s portfolio of Cyber Security Services includes global threat monitoring and analysis through a network of security operation centres, real-time adversary and industry-specific threat intelligence and incident response services. The six security operations centres are located in the US, the UK, India, Australia, Singapore and Japan. Its managed security services business is supported by a proprietary cloud-based platform that delivers a steady stream of technical and cyber adversary threat intelligence through a customisable portal.
“Cybersecurity has become one of the most critical business imperatives for all organisations regardless of industry or geographic location,” said Julie Sweet, Accenture’s CEO. “With the addition of Symantec’s Cyber Security Services business, Accenture Security will offer one of the most comprehensive managed services for global businesses to detect and manage cybersecurity threats aimed at their companies.” “Companies are facing an unprecedented volume of cyber threats that are highly-sophisticated and targeted to their businesses, and they can no longer rely solely on generic solutions,” added Kelly Bissell, senior managing director of Accenture Security. “This acquisition ... will help Accenture provide flexibility rather than a ‘one size fits all’ approach to managed security services. With Symantec’s Cyber Security Services business, we can now bring clients our combined expertise fine-tuned to their industry with tailored global threat intelligence powered by advanced analytics, automation and machine learning.”
Symantec’s Enterprise Security business, now a division of Broadcom, is headquartered in Mountain View, California and its Cyber Security Services business includes more than 300 employees around the world who serve top-tier organisations across a diverse range of industries, including financial services, utilities, health, government, communications, media, technology and retail.
“Becoming part of Accenture Security is a tremendous opportunity for our clients and our cyber warriors around the globe, enabling us to fuse the unique services, capabilities and solutions of two well-established companies to deliver the next generation of cybersecurity services,” said John Lionato, vice president and general manager of Symantec’s Cyber Security Services business.
Symantec’s Cyber Security Services business will be the latest in a series of acquisitions - including those of Deja vu Security, iDefense, Maglan, Redcore, Arismore and FusionX - that demonstrate Accenture Security’s commitment to investing in and innovating advanced threat intelligence and cybersecurity solutions.
In its 2019 fiscal year, Accenture invested nearly US$1.2bn globally on 33 acquisitions to acquire critical skills and capabilities in strategic, high-growth areas of the market.
Completion of the acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in March 2020. | https://ctmfile.com/story/accenture-to-acquire-symantecs-cyber-security-business |
Singapore Management University’s Secure Mobile Centre – Tackling cybersecurity risks in mobile computing.
Mobile computing has become a fundamental feature in modern day life as people develop an unprecedented reliance on smart phones and tablets. However, along with their ubiquity comes a host of risks that can affect personal privacy, sensitive corporate information and even national security.
Professor Robert Deng from the Singapore Management University (SMU) School of Information Systems (SIS) believes that current approaches to mobile computing security have been ineffective because they fail to consider differences between platforms and applications.
“Mobile devices are power- and resource-limited compared to desktop computers due to their smaller sizes. They are open to more channels such as mobile networks, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and storage cards. They also have increased functionality due to their ability to download applications. The mobility, connectivity and extensibility of mobile devices mean they require targeted and efficient security solutions,” says Professor Deng, who is also the director of SMU’s Secure Mobile Centre (SMC).
This calls for a new approach to security research in mobile computing, one that he and his colleagues at the SMC aim to develop.
Securing platforms and data
Launched in February 2015, the SMC is funded by Singapore’s National Research Foundation under the National Cybersecurity Research and Development Programme. The centre conducts research under three inter-related programmes, each led by professors from SIS.
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Helmed by Associate Professor Ding Xuhua, the Mobile Platform Security Programme aims to design a hardware-protected secure environment for mobile devices to safeguard the code, data and execution integrity of critical mobile apps under a compromised operating system.
Associate Professor Gao Debin heads the Mobile Application Security Programme, which studies how mobile malware spreads and how to effectively detect and contain it to minimise damage.
The Mobile Internet Service Security Programme comprises two projects. Led by Professors Robert Deng and Pang Hwee Hwa, the first project focuses on developing practical and secure solutions for sharing encrypted data in the cloud.
“Cloud data storage is becoming increasingly popular. However, since software systems are not guaranteed to be bug-free and hardware platforms are not under the direct control of data owners in the cloud, security risks are abundant. This keeps the data private even if service provider systems are compromised or untrusted,” says Professor Deng.
However, he notes that it is extremely challenging to share large amounts of data that are encrypted using traditional techniques because of the difficulty in distributing decryption keys and managing decryption key revocations. For example, when people leave an organisation, their decryption keys must be revoked so they are no longer able to access the organisation’s data.
The SMC has filed a patent on a new technique that will allow individuals and organisations to share their encrypted data in the cloud in a scalable and efficient manner. This new technique allows efficient decryption on mobile devices and supports user revocation in real-time.
The second project which is headed by Associate Professor Li Yingjiu, focuses on designing secure and usable authentication systems for mobile users.
Mobile platforms that authenticate the face of a legitimate user are not new. They are an attractive alternative to passwords, which are often difficult to remember. However, most face-authentication systems currently in use are intrinsically vulnerable to forgery by means of photos or videos of the legitimate user.
To overcome this problem, researchers at the SMC have developed FaceLive, a system that can differentiate between a photograph or video of a user and a “live” one. FaceLive corroborates facial video information with live motion data from the mobile device to verify an actual live feed from the user. It uses a front-facing camera, an accelerometer and a gyroscope to detect three-dimensional characteristics of a live user’s face by measuring the consistency between head movements captured in a video and those captured through sensors in the mobile device.
FaceLive simply requires users to hold and move their mobile device in front of their face while the front-facing camera captures a video of their face and the sensors simultaneously record motion data about their device. A live user is authenticated if changes in head movement in the video are consistent with movements captured by the device. According to Professor Deng, FaceLive can operate under complex lighting conditions and compensate for a range of cumulative errors that can happen while detecting head movements during face authentication.
Like most systems, FaceLive could be vulnerable to sophisticated attacks, but the system is an improvement on current face-detection software. “Our technique significantly raises the bar for adversaries to perform attacks,” says Professor Li.
Supporting Singapore’s technology aims
Singapore aims to establish itself as a Smart Nation by tapping into the vast potential of technology. “Mobile computing security is an important aspect, for it is essential to ensuring service continuity, integrity and privacy. The application of SMC’s work will also be relevant for a wide range of services ranging from emergency response to critical infrastructure monitoring, e-commerce to e-government services, and strengthening social networks to care for an ageing population,” notes Professor Deng.
He adds that cybersecurity research is inherently multidisciplinary for it involves cryptography, software, hardware, multimedia processing, human-computer interaction, computational cognitive modelling and security policies.
In view of this, the SMC is working closely with key industry players, including ST Electronics (a subsidiary of ST Engineering); international digital security company Gemalto, which produces SIM cards; telecommunications company StarHub; and computer security firm, McAfee Singapore, which is now part of the Intel Security Group.
To bridge research outcomes with practical needs, SMC also collaborates with various government agencies, including the Infocomm Development Authority, the Defence Science and Technology Agency, and the Monetary Authority of Singapore.
SMC’s principal investigators have held in-depth discussions with these government agencies to align their research with Singapore’s technological needs. “The team works very closely with industrial partners and end-user organisations to ensure that the project research and development deliverables not only have excellent academic value but can also be integrated into products and operational systems to create practical value of considerable impact,” says Professor Deng. | https://www.revoscience.com/en/strengthening-cybersecurity-through-research/ |
A joint operation between French and Ukrainian law enforcement has reportedly led to the arrests of several members of the Egregor ransomware operation in Ukraine. As reported first by France Inter, […]
The post Egregor ransomware affiliates arrested by Ukrainian, French police | #computerhacking | #hacking | #cybersecurity | #infosecurity | #hacker appeared first on National Cyber Security. | https://www.hitechcrimesolutions.com/egregor-ransomware-affiliates-arrested-by-ukrainian-french-police-computerhacking-hacking-cybersecurity-infosecurity-hacker/ |
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Last year, South Africa had the third highest number of cybercrime victims in the world resulting in losses of R2.2 billion. In a world of data breaches and hacks, cyber security is important for everyone with an online presence, more so for businesses with the responsibility to protect customers. The question is: who protects the businesses? This is why cybercrime insurance is a vital part of making any business future fit.
Philippa Wild, Head: Commercial Underwriting from Santam says, “With the world changing in the way it is, it is important that companies stay ready for what lies ahead. One great advantage of having cyber insurance is that it enables a business to bounce back from specified business interruptions and financial losses incurred as a result of cybercrime. Cyber insurance also helps with the practical side of getting IT experts to restore systems, recreate data and pre-empt new threats.”
Who should be concerned about cybercrime?
In today’s digital world, all organisations, big or small, including SMEs (Small and Medium Enterprises), are at risk of a cyberattack. The advancement of technology and remote work has left many people vulnerable to crimes like hacking, data theft and damage, and even industrial espionage. In short, everyone must be concerned about cybercrime. These are some of the most affected industries:
Small businesses: By virtue of the fact that they simply do not have enough resources to invest in adequate security measures, small businesses are at greater risk of phishing and malware attacks.
Healthcare sector: Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, this industry has seen a spike in denial of service and ransomware attacks. These can be especially costly as businesses in this industry are often extorted for large ransoms in order to resume their life-saving services.
Financial institutions: Thanks to the proliferation of mobile banking apps, financial institutions are at greater risk of cybercrime such as server attacks and data theft where hackers use malicious code to infiltrate servers and steal financial information and money.
Online education: Thanks to the increased use of various technologies, this sector is experiencing spikes in spam and phishing attacks.
The implications and risks of not having cyber insurance
The average small business hack attack can cost your company anywhere between R50 000 to R250 000 and more and will require you to manage POPI (Protection of Personal Information) regulations, keep employees updated on proper digital hygiene and constantly back up your data. Furthermore, if your business possesses or has experienced any of the following, you are at risk of cyberattacks and need cyber insurance:
Your business stores credit-card data: You could be exposed to security breaches in terms of your customers’ confidential information, running the risk of liabilities occurring from breach of their privacy.
Your business stores or processes sensitive third-party data: You could have contractual liability if third-party data is leaked, in addition to harming the brand’s reputation.
Your business uses a transactional and interactive website or e-commerce platform: This means you could face regulatory penalties if a breach were to occur.
Your business uses a cloud service provider to store sensitive information: You could be held accountable for any information lost during a breach of the system.
The beauty of having cybercrime insurance
Peace of mind. Ultimately there is no price one can put on that. As a business moves more towards e-commerce and an even greater online presence, it becomes increasingly important and more prudent to be protected from cyber criminals.
Cyberattacks can lead to significant losses. Insurance can help by covering things like
Liability for accidental loss of data.
Liability for loss of data and its consequences by deliberate, dishonest, negligent, and fraudulent means.
Accidental damage caused by computer-driven property or equipment.
Loss or damage caused by failures or computer malfunction.
Loss, damage, and liability caused by algorithmic errors and malfunction.
Loss of intellectual property, reputation, and business opportunities.
It is important that clients understand the terms and conditions of their cyber cover, which includes details on what is covered, up to what limits and what is excluded.
Knowledge is power when it comes to matters of cyber security. Equip yourself as a business and protect and empower your people with the peace of mind that comes from cyber insurance.
For more information on cyber insurance, please visit www.santam.co.za. | https://www.thesmallbusinesssite.co.za/2022/07/25/your-business-needs-cyber-security-insurance-heres-why/ |
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6.1Has specific training been given to cover unusual hazards and are records available and up to date?
6.2Are First Aid arrangements covered in local job induction training and are records available and up to date?
6.3Are First Aid arrangements covered in any Permit to Work systems operated?
6.4Are procedures in place to brief contractors on First Aid arrangements?
6.5Is emergency First Aid training given to staff that work alone or in small groups?
Notes: For optimal printing use the print button at the end of this assessment and set your printer options NOT to print headers and footers. To scroll down use a combination of the two scroll bars (browser page and topic page scroll bars) | https://qhse.support/topics/first-aid-risk-assessment-6.htm |
California child care facilities are reporting five times as many coronavirus cases as of this week than they were a little more than a month ago, although the percentage of centers reporting any cases remains small.
It is unclear how alarming this statistic should be for parents and preschool teachers in the state. Although the number of cases increased, less than 2% of open child care facilities reported any cases, according to state data. More programs did open in that one-month period, but that increase was only about 14%, compared to a 394% increase in the number of cases reported.
“I think the jump in child care facilities probably reflects the jump in cases in our community in general,” said Naomi Bardach, a doctor and associate professor of pediatrics and health policy at UC San Francisco. However, she added, there isn’t enough information yet to know what the data means. “It’s hard to interpret what is going on. Is that because they’re getting it at home or is that because they’re getting it at day cares?”
Licensed child care facilities, which include both centers and programs operated out of providers’ homes, are required to report any case of Covid-19 among staff, children and family members to the California Department of Social Services Community Care Licensing Division, which oversees licensing for child care facilities. The facilities serve infants, toddlers, preschoolers and some school-age children up to 12 years old.
As of June 4, licensed child care facilities across California had reported 202 cases of Covid-19 to the department. The data did not include how many centers reported those cases.
By July 12, the total had gone up to 998. Close to a fifth of those cases were among children. About a third of the cases were among staff, and another third were among parents or other adults who pick up or drop off children at the child care center. The remaining cases were other family members of children, or people who lived with child care providers.
For details, check out the document at the end of this report.
The vast majority of open child care facilities in California have not reported a single case — only 658 out of 38,113 facilities that are open reported any. That means most of those that have reported cases have only reported one or two per facility, which might indicate that most staff members and families are getting sick elsewhere in the community and not at the child care centers themselves.
But the California Department of Social Services has not disclosed how many cases were reported at each center, or if there were any centers that had more than two cases. That information could help show if the coronavirus is spreading within some child care programs. The California Department of Social Services declined a request for an interview. The California Department of Public Health did not respond to an interview request.
The social services department has not disclosed how many children and staff attend and work at each facility either. The number of family members for each child is also unknown, since that information is not tracked. That information would help show the rates of the coronavirus in the population.
The California Department of Social Services updates data regularly here under the “Additional Resources” tab.
In addition to the state requirement, child care facilities are required to report cases to the families they serve and to their county public health department, which then advises them whether to close and for how long and who needs to quarantine. In general, those who are in contact with someone who has Covid-19 have to quarantine for 14 days to contain the spread of the virus. The county departments of public health might also ask all close contacts to get tested.
The increase is concerning to Marcy Whitebook, director emerita at the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE) based at UC Berkeley. The center researches policies for improving conditions for the early education workforce. Whitebook and others at the center have called for more state and federal funding for child care facilities to stay closed until it is safe to open, as well as hazard pay and health insurance for all providers.
“I was hoping to be proven wrong, that when we opened up more, we wouldn’t see an increase,” Whitebook said.
When the shelter-in-place order first began in California in March, child care facilities were only available to the children of essential workers, like nurses, grocery store clerks, child care providers and farm workers. But in early June, child care facilities were allowed to reopen for all children, if they meet health and safety guidelines like wearing masks and keeping children in small groups and six feet apart, as much as possible.
Whitebook said child care providers have told her organization that they have struggled to get the masks, face shields, gloves and cleaning supplies they need to keep themselves safe, and many providers are unsure what to do if someone in the center is exposed to Covid-19 or tests positive.
“There’s generally a feeling out in the child care community that people are being asked to make these choices around their own health, the health of their families. They have deep questions about whether or not it’s safe, and they also have to work because of their own livelihood,” Whitebook said. “The population of people who are doing child care, just looking at California, is majority Black and brown women. It’s a population that has been more exposed and more at risk for Covid. And we also know that generally speaking they may not have health coverage, they may not have paid sick leave. Many providers are older. They’re living in multigenerational families or in households where it’s very hard to get distanced. Are we doing those things that would mitigate the risk?”
Lupe Jaime, director of Lighthouse for Children, a child care center for children 5 years old and younger in Fresno, said the center opened last Monday, and it wasn’t until this week that she found out that her facility needs to report cases of Covid-19 among family members, in addition to staff and children. Jaime said it is overwhelming to keep on top of all the health and safety standards. So far, there have been no coronavirus cases at the facility.
“To be juggling health and safety standards, knowing that our Covid-19 cases remain on the rise in Fresno County, and to maintain quality and individualized care, is just really difficult, and difficult to juggle,” Jaime said.
Carolyn Carpenter, who runs a preschool out of her home in Oakland, said she knows of one provider who had a parent test positive. She’s worried about the risk as the number of cases goes up and more families return to work.
“It seems like it’s getting harder and harder to hope that I’m not going to come into contact with it,” Carpenter said. She is doing the best she can to meet the health and safety guidelines, but she says some of them are not realistic, especially with toddlers.
“You can’t social distance from kids you’re taking care of,” she said. “And it’s unrealistic to expect that kids are going to stay six feet away from each other all day long.”
Bardach, the doctor from UCSF, said it is important for preschool teachers and other child care providers to be especially careful around their colleagues, parents and other adults because most transmission of the coronavirus appears to be from one adult to another, rather than from children to adults.
“The places where we have the biggest risks in these settings is, for example, people who go to break rooms and take off their masks together because we’re used to thinking the patient is where my risk of infection is, or the student is where my risk of infection is,” Bardach said. “We tend to take down our guard when we’re around friends and colleagues.”
As schools and child care centers reopen, Bardach said, it is important to make sure it is done safely.
“We know more now than we did in March about how to keep things safe, but the safety measures have to be in place, and they have to include good testing capacity to also find cases and stop transmission as quickly as possible,” Bardach said. | https://nationalcybersecurity.com/coronavirus-cases-spike-in-california-child-care-facilities-coronavirus-kids-children-parenting-parenting-kids/ |
It's an attack on the client, but the fix can be implemented on either the client or the server.
Ideally all routers and access points would be fixed, because the chances of older Android devices with stock ROMs receiving a fix is zero.
It's a massive, massive problem.
From what I understand, this crack does not allow access but allows a person to view the data stream.
Like opening up a window shade, but the window is still closed.
From the articles I read, it is a client side problem, unless your router is acting as a client AP (then the router becomes a problem).
However, the person sniffing has to be in close proximity to the effected client (ie within your wifi range). So you wont have to worry about foreign hackers getting into your system unless they are parked outside your house!
The attacker can't get the wifi password, but they can still do some pretty nasty stuff. From the report:
The ability to decrypt packets can be used to decrypt TCP SYN packets. This allows an adversary to obtain the TCP sequence numbers of a connection, and hijack TCP connections. As a result, even though WPA2 is used, the adversary can now perform one of the most common attacks against open Wi-Fi networks: injecting malicious data into unencrypted HTTP connections. For example, an attacker can abuse this to inject ransomware or malware into websites that the victim is visiting.
As Sortec pointed out, it stands to reason that in the case that Tomato is operating in "Wireless Client" mode it is potentially vulnerable even though Tomato does not implement 802.11r. The Aruba Networks article to which you linked seems to also suggest this:
When used successfully against WPA2 with AES-CCMP (the default mode of operation for most Wi-Fi networks), an attacker can decrypt and replay Wi-Fi frames, but cannot forge packets and inject them into the network. When used against WPA-TKIP – an encryption scheme that already suffers from serious security weaknesses and is not recommended for use – an attacker can decrypt, replay, and forge Wi-Fi frames.
Exactly which frames can be decrypted, replayed, and (possibly) forged is slightly more complicated. Table 3 of the research paper provides the answer. If a vulnerable client is attacked through the 4-way handshake vulnerability, only client-to-AP traffic can be attacked. If a vulnerable AP is attacked through the 802.11r FT handshake, then AP-to-client traffic can be attacked. Disabling 802.11r on the AP (or installing software updates to fix the vulnerability) will block the ability to attack AP-to-client traffic.
Some clients will replay with limited or faulty encryption. The only fix is to update the client.
The router-to-client vulnerability is 802.11r (FT), which Tomato doesn't implement.
There are additional vulnerabilities if you're using WPA2/TKIP and WPA2/GCMP, the fix is to switch to WPA2/CCMP. Incidentally GCMP is a streamlined form of CCMP (AES) because apparently 802.11AC wasn't fast enough for someone, and of course the streamlining introduced issues.
All packets can be read at any time if they're sent via WiFi. Or hold onto the capture until an exploit is found, then use the exploit to crack the encryption.
If a client isn't updated KRACK can make the client replay packets. The big thing about KRACK was finding bugs that caused clients to replay packets which also exposed bugs in clients that caused encryption to either not be used or substantially weakened. Anyone within range can capture the data you're sending over WiFi and then, at their leisure, sit around trying to crack the encryption. If someone with skills who can reverse-engineer the wireless drivers (they're binary blobs), patch whatever it needs to be patched, and have deep pockets to cover the lawsuit Broadcom will move against the individual, then perhaps we can have this vulnerability rectified in Tomato (we have like 5 architectures or so).
The binary blob stuff was discussed exhaustively on this forum. I'm pretty sure Broadcom will show the door to invididuals trying to obtain a license for their SDK.
I don't think Broadcom will be charitable with us individuals and provide binary blobs compatible and linked against our libraries/kernels.
Current binaries for Asus ARM routers cannot be used on Tomato, because of both licensing issues (e.g. Trend Micro's DPI engine) and missing components (wireless driver won't load - kernel panic). So even if Asuswrt's tree gets patched, it's still an issue for Tomato.
I don't know if breaking the WiFi standard is a particularly good way of handling this issue. I'd just toss clients that can't/won't be updated, instead of introducing issues with pretty much every client at random times.
I get that telecom vendors don't believe in actually supporting the products they're selling, but maybe this is a wake-up call to not buy the products they're selling. I'm getting ready to buy an unlocked phone from someone other than a telecom vendor specifically so I don't get stuck relying on them for updates. A large portion of their revenue comes from overcharging for equipment on a monthly basis, if enough people switch to service-only plans their revenue will take a hit. And service-only plans are cheaper.
community cannot roll their own drivers (seems the LEDE crowd might have).
If all they have are SDKs /datasheets/ etc... then those "organizations" failed basic engineering of the "always have a second source" variety.
The contrary. Diagrams, specsheets, data sheets, source code, protocols, patents, APIs, etc. are private, closed-source, non-public information that are licensed for organizations upon signing NDA and many other agreements in order to protect their intellectual property.
That's why LEDE doesn't work properly on Netgears, and won't work for quite a while (Devices with Broadcom WiFi chipsets have limited LEDE supportability (due to limited FLOSS driver availability for Broadcom chips) unless they fully reverse-engineer the whole thing themselves (and I hope Broadcom won't begin a witch hunt against them such as DMCA takedowns and issue cease and desist orders).
There are other SoC vendors aside Broadcom, so Asus, Netgear, TP-Link, Tenda, Belkin, etc, can always have second/third/fourth and so on sources, such as Atheros, Realtek, Ralink, etc.
Our main problem is that Tomato is stuck on Broadcom, and get really get rid of it. We're pretty much at the end of line with Tomato (as it's hard to have new hardware supported).
It's a good thing that there is LEDE out there, so one day we'll all forget about Tomato and move on with something else. Until then both my Netgears are dead (WNR3500Lv2 is dead, R7000 and R8000 still left).
Click to expand...
This has been discussed ad nauseam.
Broadcom chip internals and source is not open. Broadcom does not sell to end users, only manufacturers. Manufacturers have access to all they need assuming they have an SDK license. Big boys like ASUS and Netgear have them - assumably, the SDK license is worked into most chip deals. Open source projects do not have a license and do not have access unless they pay the $ for the SDK.
DD-WRT is the only third party project known to have access to a Broadcom SDK license and can compile their own drivers. I don't know if that access is via a license purchased by DD-WRT outright or as a by-product of their relationship with Buffalo.
OpenWRT/LEDE has buggy and limited drivers cobbled together from what is published and reverse engineered. I consider it mostly useless, but some don't.
"Always have a second source" is a fallacy. It just doesn't apply in any real sense to SoC products. The second source is another SoC with a completely different board. It's not all that uncommon for v1 of a model to be Broadcom and v2 of the otherwise same model number to be Atheros (or vice versa).
The contrary. They can't be out there.
... (and I hope Broadcom won't begin a witch hunt against them such as DMCA takedowns and issue cease and desist orders). | http://www.linksysinfo.org/index.php?threads/krack-vulnerability-in-tomatousb.73823/ |
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The front page of LinkedIn's new Chinese language site.
After exploring the market for years, LinkedIn is formally entering China with a new beta site that will adhere to the nation's strict rules on online censorship.
The new Chinese language site, called Lingying, launched on Monday and hopes to tap over 140 million professionals living in the country, LinkedIn said in a company blog post.
The professional social networking site has been eyeing the Chinese market, where it already has four million members. But until Monday LinkedIn had largely been an English-language site to users in the country.
By launching the site, the company has also agreed to follow China's controversial regulations on censorship. Those rules generally require local sites to filter out politically sensitive content, either by deleting user posts, curtailing certain searches or shutting down user accounts.
On Monday, LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner wrote in a blog post that the company supports free speech and disagrees with government censorship. But after discussing the matter with experts, including business leaders and global human rights groups, LinkedIn decided more could be in gained in helping Chinese users connect to new economic opportunities.
"Extending our service in China raises difficult questions, but it is clear to us that the decision to proceed is the right one," Weiner wrote.
The Chinese site plans to only censor content when required, and LinkedIn said it will be transparent about its practices in China. "Extensive measures" will also be taken to protect company users' data, Weiner added.
It's unclear if abiding to China's online censorship will affect LinkedIn's English-language website. In February 2011, LinkedIn was briefly blocked in China at a time when local authorities were clamping down on mentions of a pro-democratic movement called the "Jasmine Revolution."
LinkedIn is just the latest U.S. Internet company to try to enter China, a market foreign firms have often struggled to compete in. Google and Yahoo once had major ambitions to expand in the country, but have clashed with China's demands on content control.
In the case of Yahoo, the company found itself in controversy over the jailing of a Chinese journalist. In 2004, the journalist was arrested after Yahoo provided Chinese authorities with his email records that detailed the government's attempts to restrict local media.
In addition, LinkedIn is coming to the market late when others such as rival Viadeo Group have been active in the country. In 2007, Viadeo acquired the Chinese professional social networking site Tianji.com. Early last year, the site had over 14 million users.
But the bigger obstacle for LinkedIn comes from China's domestic Internet firms, according to Ben Cavender, an analyst with China Market Research Group. Already, many Chinese Internet users are relying on local social networking platforms, such as Sina Weibo and WeChat, to not only communicate with friends and read news, but also find jobs. Both Sina Weibo and WeChat each have over 300 million registered users. At the same time, many of LinkedIn's prospective users in China -- those who speak English and are looking for international opportunities -- are already on the site, Cavender said.
To grow, the company will have to provide a strong contact base as well as job opportunities for Chinese-language users. "I think it's possible that they could do quite well here," Cavender said. "They are well established already in bigger cities like Shanghai and Beijing but it will take time to build the user base in other markets in China. The Chinese language version of the site should allow them to do this."
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There have been reports, lately, of people suffering from something called “Zoom fatigue.” It’s a second pandemic we should have seen coming: the video-conferencing tool Zoom, for weeks the most downloaded app in the App Store, has caused widespread burnout.
What to do? One could try this spring’s second-most downloaded app and see if it’s any better. Houseparty, launched in 2016, allows users to convene in “rooms” of up to eight people and entertain themselves with virtual board games (including a Pictionary knockoff) and trivia quizzes. Before the pandemic, Houseparty was a Gen-Z hangout, a mid-tier player in the video-calling leagues. Then the app gained fifty million new users in one month. It’s the virtual living room to Zoom’s virtual office.
On a recent Sunday, a few newbies—an educator in the U.K., an obstetrician in New York City, a P.R. manager for an ovulation-tracking app in Berlin—gathered on Houseparty for a birthday celebration. The app was glitching. “I can’t really hear anyone,” the Berliner said, as he poured himself a glass of sparkling rosé. “Shall we switch to Zoom?”
Three hours later and six thousand miles to the west, Julia Onken was getting ready to do a group workout on Houseparty; she works in marketing for the app. At twenty-six, she was already a little old to be on the app—before the lockdown, she said, ninety per cent of users were under twenty-four, though older generations have since been catching on. As a millennial recently texted a friend, trying to arrange a meeting on Houseparty, “FaceTime is so pre-Covid.”
Onken, who lives in San Francisco, said, “I haven’t left my apartment, but I’m more social than I think I’ve ever been.” The night before, she’d had a first date with a guy who lives three blocks away. “We matched on Bumble, and he suggested FaceTime and wine,” she said. “I was, like, Houseparty and White Claw?”
Houseparty users are encouraged to imagine that they physically inhabit their digital space. Opening the app sends an alert that you are “in the house,” where you can “wave” at others, or, if you like, “ghost” them. As at an actual social event, it can be hard to avoid old acquaintances. Signing up sends a notification to every user who has your number: your boss, your therapist, your ex. Friends can wander into groups at will—or by accident—unless someone “locks the room.” Once inside, it can be hard to hear over the chatter. Despite the cheery prompts that the app provides—“Harry Potter is the same age as Kim Kardashian,” “You can’t hum while holding your nose”—conversation tends toward small talk. An activity helps.
Once Onken was ready, Aimee Jen, a thirty-year-old in black leggings and a baggy gray T-shirt, joined the room. “This is my first time on Houseparty,” she said, through a chirrup of feedback. “I feel so old and uncool.” She, too, was stuck at home, although her dog, a diabetic mutt named George, sometimes forced her out of the house.
At noon, the women opened Instagram and started a live Barry’s Bootcamp class. While Jen fiddled with her volume, Onken performed a series of squats. On Instagram, a muscle-bound instructor shouted into the camera: “Let’s go hard! Hold it! We’ve got eight seconds, then we’re going to lay on the floor, in five! In four! In three! Two! One!” Onken lay on her back with the soles of her feet in closeup. On the other side of the split screen, the dog sauntered into the shot and sat on Jen’s legs.
After catching her breath, Onken was on to her next Houseparty appointment, a pub quiz with college friends in London. “We’ve been hosting these quizzes every few days,” Georgina Coward, a fashion merchandiser, who was quarantining in Southwark, said. “You can get really upset and depressed, or you can just make the most of it.” Her co-host, Fiona Endersen, agreed. “We were finding that conversations went straight back to coronavirus,” she said. “But, with this, people feel like they’ve escaped for an hour.”
The room filled up, and Coward, holding a big inflatable microphone, started asking questions: Zayn Malik’s age (twenty-seven), the scent of a candle recently released by Gwyneth Paltrow (her own vagina). The contestants, lonely but not alone, slumped on sofas or lounged in bed, half-drunk wineglasses foregrounded in their rectangles of screen. For a sonic round, Coward and Endersen sang snatches from “The Sound of Music.” Onken was stumped. “I don’t know a single musical!” she said.
The first prize, a four-pack of toilet paper, went to Coward’s brother. Endersen told him he could pick it up when the lockdown ended—unless somebody else won it in the meantime. There’d be another quiz next week, she said. “For now, there’s nothing else to do but call people.” ? | https://nationalcybersecurity.com/bumble-tinder-pof-zoom-fatigue-try-houseparty-the-new-yorker-romancescams-scams/ |
The past couple of months have, at times, seemed more like a movie script than actual reality. Fortunately, this movie we are living through includes scenes that make us hopeful and show us a path to where we, as technologists, should strive to be. Let me give you a glimpse into our story, which fits more into the inspiring feel-good category rather than the catastrophic drama that, unfortunately, many of our fellow global citizens are living through at this moment.
Sunday, March 15: CAPTRUST’s leadership team decided that the following day would be our last day in the office. Later that evening, we distributed a message using our urgent notification system to all employees informing them to prepare to work from home starting Tuesday, March 17. From that point on, only 27 named employees out of 700 team members were on the list to be allowed back into any of our facilities.
Monday, March 16: Admittedly, there was a scramble—but not a network or VPN scramble. Our employees were busy packing their monitors, docking stations, keyboards, and mice to replicate their workspaces at home and make working from home as productive (or nearly as productive) as being in their office.
Wednesday, March 18: On day two of our mandated work-from-home journey, we all caught our breath and started to realize that we were good—as good as one can be in the midst of a global pandemic—and people started to settle in for the long haul. Naturally, our people were scared about the looming economic downturn and market volatility, as we are an employee-owned, independent investment advisor with $370 billion of assets under advisement. The steady drip of negative economic and health-related news that exacerbates fears among our clients with regard to their financial investments and beyond translates into additional work for us as their trusted partner. Hence, not having to be worried about our core technology or our staff being able to continue to serve our clients and the community was extremely important in our Business Continuity efforts.
Since we had implemented Zscaler Internet Access (ZIA) for internet security policy enforcement and Zscaler Private Access (ZPA) as our primary remote access solution, we had no issues (and hope to have no issues in the future) transitioning to a fully remote workforce. With ZIA, our users are still subject to web filtering and internet access policies, protecting them wherever they work. ZPA also provides them access to private applications, such as our phone system, without sacrificing user experience.
Preparing for business continuity in times of stability
I attribute our positive experience switching to working from home to our journey to the cloud, which we began in early 2017. We moved core systems, such as Microsoft Dynamics CE, into the cloud and repositioned most of our server assets to Azure. We shed running our own email and SharePoint, and moved this into Office 365. The year saw so much change! As part of this project, we realized that the cloud experience that we were embracing would be tarnished if we kept our traditional network in place.
At the time, our MPLS network was secured with appliances for our headquarters and a cloud solution from the same vendor for regional offices. It was virtually impossible to keep them synchronized in terms of policy, and we were never able to get the appliances to work properly in our headquarters. Hence, we switched to an SD-WAN solution and knew that, with so many Internet egress points, only a cloud-based security solution would be able to meet our security needs and scale with our growth. After an unplanned but fateful meeting with Lisa Lorenzin from Zscaler at Microsoft Ignite, we embarked on our journey with Zscaler.
In January 2020, we knew COVID-19 was coming—to what degree was debatable—and convened our Critical Incident Response Team to take the necessary steps to be prepared for conceivable eventualities. We rolled out softphones. We urged leaders to think about backup personnel for backup personnel in case of mass absenteeism. We asked everyone to validate that they could work from home, and made sure USB dongles, HDMI cords, and Ethernet cables were provided.
When March 17 came around, we did not have to make any network and security changes, adjust capacity, or even install new equipment—any of which would very likely risk the introduction of security misconfigurations or performance failures. For us, Zscaler is an integral part of a solid BCP/DR program and has proven itself in this difficult situation.
Being able to continue our work uninterrupted has allowed us to constantly serve our clients throughout these turbulent times and continue with M&A activity, which is an important driver for the sustained growth of our business. In March, we successfully completed the 40th acquisition in 14 years, and using ZIA and ZPA, we were able to get our new employees set up and productive almost immediately.
What also drives us at CAPTRUST is giving back to the communities in which we live. Our mission is not only to grow our business and keep our operations stable but also to be a stabilizing factor for our community. Through the CAPTRUST Community Foundation, we strive to enrich the lives of children by raising $10 million by 2026 through employee contributions. Our CEO issued a challenge at the end of March to raise an additional $100,000 so we could double emergency grants to local agencies that support people through the pandemic. Little did he know that our employees would surpass that total to reach $137,000 in only three weeks. So far, $95,000 has been distributed to 50 nonprofits nationwide.
This situation is taxing for everyone, but I know we will see brighter days ahead. Just as we got through the financial crisis in 2008, we will get through this as well. While we are waiting for a treatment or a cure, we cannot let fear gnaw at us, and we have to stay productive to serve our clients and communities with service beyond expectation, exactly as called for in our company mission.
This post first appeared as a LinkedIn article. We appreciate Jon Meyer's permission to post it on the Zscaler blog. | https://www.zscaler.com/blogs/corporate/how-outage-prepared-captrust-pandemic |
Noodles & Co. reports card-payment data breach
By rachel riley [email protected]
If you've paid with plastic while dining at one of Colorado Springs' five Noodles & Company locations this year, you might want to check on the security of your credit or debit card.
The Broomfield-based restaurant chain said Tuesday that a data breach may have put payment information on cards used to at the restaurants between Jan. 31 and June 2. Visitors during that time are encouraged to review their financial statements and check with card companies for anything out of the ordinary.
Credit and debit cards can now safely be used at the restaurant chain, the company said.
The company began investigating unusual activity reported by its credit card processor in mid-May, and suspicious activity was detected on company computer systems June 2.
Noodles & Company is working with law enforcement to investigate the data breach and strengthen security measures to ensure that it does not happen again, CEO Kevin Reddy said in a post on the restaurant chain's website. | https://gazette.com/crime/noodles-co-reports-card-payment-data-breach/article_af8b2595-543b-5d77-aac8-505fc5feea47.html |
Avert potential customer service issues.
Escalate issues in time to take care of customer concerns.
Receive early warning signals to prevent fraudulent transactions, High value transactions.
Prevent fraudulent transactions and financial loss.
Centillion’s Information System (IS) Audit assesses an organization’s information security processes and procedures. The audit primarily focuses on the organization’s information risk and its compliance with established information security standards.
Centillion’s IS Audit assists in the assessment of risk to an organization’s IT infrastructure, network security, network performance, application and information security, and IT architecture security. Technical, functional and process audit for all aspects of security are part of the Information Security Audit.
The IT Infrastructure Audit encompasses logical, physical, and environmental security of the organization’s IT assets.
The Network Security Audit primarily focuses on the security of an organizations network and networking components.
Application Security Audits are conducted in line with OWASP security guidelines, and checks for exploitable vulnerabilities on hosted web servers, database servers, and ERP solutions.
Network Performance Audits focus on understanding and highlighting performance bottlenecks due to network components. Vulnerability Assessment to identify and quantify vulnerabilities in a system and Penetration testing to evaluate the security of a computer system or network are integral parts of this audit.
Centillion, through its Compliance Audit, enables organizations to establish and maintain an Information Security Management System (ISMS) and a Business Continuity Management System (BCMS) which enable organizations to adapt and respond rapidly to internal or external disruptions or threats.
Computer software is a form of intellectual property and is covered under copyright laws. Centillion assists in conducting a Software Compliance Audit to check and ensure that the client is compliant with such copyright laws.
Auditing revenue leakage is not only critical but is a highly complex and resource-intensive activity. Considerable amount of total industry revenue is lost due to errors, mistaken calculations, incorrect refunds, and inappropriate commission calculations.
Centillion audit for revenue leakage enables Banks, NBFCs, and other organizations and companies to minimize revenue leakage and generate revenue recovery. The audit identifies internal discrepancies, determines revenue, taxes, refunds, and commissions, and accordingly generates debit or credit memos for revenue gains/losses, and reduces the need for manual interventions and associated errors.
Cutting-edge auditing technology, greater data accuracy, enhanced revenue recovery, improved auditing processes, and efficient and timely processing are some of the hallmarks of the system. The user-friendly revenue leakage platform helps to improve profitability by protecting revenue leakage areas and by generating additional revenue, providing quick search functionalities, enabling process and solution effectiveness, improving efficiency, implementing cost-efficient and innovative processes, regulatory compliance.
Maximum 863 34 in)
Minimum Document Size 50.8 mm x 63.5 mm (2.0 in. x 2.5 in)
Long Document Mode Length Up to 9.1 m (360 in.)
Minimum 63.5 mm (2.5 in. x 2.5 in.)
rice paper to 80 g/m2 (20 lb.) bond
As Chairman of Indecomm Group, Naresh leads a team of highly accomplished fellow professional entrepreneurs. The executive team has worked as one seamless unit overcoming and converting difficult business cycles to build two formidable and distinctive businesses. Indecomm Mortgage Solutions is a technology platform-driven company offering automation, outsourcing, and compliance solutions in the mortgage services space. Complementing strong organic growth with select acquisitions is the forte of this team. He is the Principal Founder of Indecomm in 2003, which has been consistently ranked amongst the Global Top 100 IT and ITeS providers for over a decade.
Prior to founding Indecomm and Centillion, he held various senior roles within the Unilever organization for 21 years, on assignments both in India and abroad. He was a key member of Unilever’s core Mergers & Acquisitions team in London and a Special Assistant to the Chairman of Unilever. In India, he became the youngest member on the Board of Hindustan Lever Limited. Naresh was also the COO/Operating Partner in Connect Capital and was responsible for identifying investment opportunities in the ITeS space. Naresh was a Founding Fellow of the 21st Century Trust, a non-profit group that brings together leaders from all parts of the world and different professional backgrounds to maximize creative thinking about the key challenges facing the world in the coming generation. He is a distinguished member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India and attended the Advanced Management Program at Harvard Business School.
Balaji brings 31 years of experience in the areas of Finance, Operations, Technology, and Business Strategy. He is responsible for maintaining the highest standards of corporate governance, risk management and reporting for the Indecomm Group. In addition to his primary role as CFO, he is deeply involved in all corporate strategic initiatives involving acquisitions, restructuring, innovative financing, and related areas. As a licensed mortgage loan originator for several US states, Balaji has a deep understanding of the business.
Prior to joining Indecomm, Balaji held senior strategy and technology leadership positions at Dun & Bradstreet. Before that, he was the CFO and COO of SeraNova India, International Controller of Intelligroup, Inc. (a Nasdaq-listed software services company) and CFO of a multinational advertising agency in India. Balaji was also part of a start-up initiative that was successfully sold to a multi-national group.
As CEO Rajan leads Indecomm Global Services, a leading provider of business process as a service (BPaaS), software technology, and learning products for the US mortgage industry. Indecomm has a proven track record of over 25 years in the mortgage industry, working with large and mid-sized lenders, servicers, mortgage insurers, and title companies as a trusted partner with a singular focus – helping them grow.
Prior to joining Indecomm in 2003, Rajan was the co-founder and CEO of ikigo Inc. At ikigo, Rajan was responsible for the successful development and marketing of a unique monitoring software solution to Fortune 500 companies. Before starting ikigo, Rajan had served as COO at SeraNova Inc, a NASDAQ-listed e-Business Services Company.
Rajan’s areas of expertise include business strategy development and execution, global organization and development, sales and marketing, and e-Business and Internet solutions. He has the necessary blend of experience and expertise for creating and managing a high-growth offshore IT services and outsourcing company.
In a career spanning almost three decades, Muralidhar has worked with consumer centric categories in industries across the spectrum including Banking, Retail and has witnessed the industry evolve and grow over time.
In his current role as Vice President, Muralidhar oversees the Rural Banking Operation function. He leads a team of skilled BC professionals in settings up new business correspondence and driving its implementation across rural segment.
Prior to joining Centillion, Mr. Muralidhar was heading the Branch Operations as Branch Head at HDFC Bank, successfully led the many branches in Bangalore. He comes with a deep experience of opening branches and setting-up things from ground zero. He has won several best accreditations in HDFC Bank and comes with a rich revenue chasing experience. He has been at a leadership position managing large team size and with a record achievement of very low attrition.
Muralidhar is passionate about cricket & badminton and enjoys watching the game.
Abhijit Maitra joined Centillion as the CEO in June 2020 to spearhead the planned strategic growth of the organization in Rural Banking, Mortgage Services, Enterprise Digitization with commitment to deliver exceptional services to the clients.
Abhijit brings decades of experience in the banking sector and has an exceptional track record of scaling up businesses to potential. He was the Senior President and National Head for Financial Inclusion at Yes Bank, and had spent more than a decade in the Bank, successfully managing and growing various departments like Commercial Banking, Priority Sector Lending and Agri & Micro Finance and Inclusive and Social Banking Groups. He has worked with ICICI Bank, Centurion Bank of Punjab, Axis Bank (previously UTI Bank) and GCMMF (Amul) in various senior capacities. Abhijit holds a Master’s degree in Agriculture from Kolkata University and is also an alumnus of the Post Graduate Program (PRM) of the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA).
Abhijit’s unique and diversified experience adds significant value to Centillion’s overall operations and continued success for our clients.
Mamatha has over 21 years of experience in managing Human Resources function and is currently responsible for managing the Global HR function for Indecomm Group. She has been with Indecomm and Centillion from Inception and has been involved in organization’s transformational journey. She has been part of the core team in implementing organizational-wide initiatives including capability development, change management, pre and post-merger consolidation of HR practices and building a strong talent pool throughout the organization. She has been involved in corporate business restructuring exercises and a member of the due-diligence team for acquisitions.
Prior to joining Indecomm, Mamatha was managing the HR function at Provimi, one of the leading veterinary pharmaceutical companies. Mamatha holds a postgraduate degree in Industrial Psychology from Mysore University where she secured a university rank. She also holds a post graduate diploma in Human Resources Management.
Harish is responsible for the IT Engineering division, which delivers Indecomm and Centillion’s mortgage/digitization products and helps improve quality, by automation within the operations team. He has over 20 years of experience in the product IT engineering space. Harish is very passionate about product development and has played various management and technical roles in product management organizations. He has architected several key products, including complex systems like LoS. Prior to joining Indecomm, he was with Cognizant as Delivery Director, and as a Program Director at CoreLogic.
Harish is a science graduate in IT and holds a master’s degree in business administration. He is certified in PMP, Machine Learning, Statistical Process Control, Statistical Techniques for Data Mining and Business Analytics and is a Microsoft Certified System Engineer. Harish is an avid researcher and is pursuing his Doctoral program (Ph.D.) from Mysore University, on “Using social media as a dataset for Credit Risk Monitoring, with special reference to mortgage loans.” He has published three research papers on usage of social media datasets.
Maximum 356 14 in.); Long Document Mode: up to 3 meters (118.1 in.)
Minimum 65.0 mm (2.5 in. Feeder Up to 75 sheets (20 lb./80 g/m2) paper; handles small documents such as ID cards, embossed hard cards, business cards, and insurance cards
Max./Min. 50 mm x 50 mm (2 in. x 2 in.) Long document mode: 216 mm x 4,064 160 in.)
Paper Thickness and Weight 34–413 g/m² (9–110 lb.) paper; ID card thickness: up to 1.25 mm (0.05 in.)
Feeder Handles small documents such as ID cards, embossed hard cards, business cards and insurance cards – Up to 75 sheets of 80 g/m² (20 lb.) paper
Max./Min. 863 mm (8.5 x 34 in.) / paper
Max./Min. paper
Power Consumption Scanner: off mode: <0.35 watts; sleep mode: <4 watts; running mode: <32 watts
Dimensions Weight: 5.5 kg (12 lbs.) Depth: 162 mm (6.3 in.), not including input tray and output tray Width: 330 mm (13 in.) Height: 246 mm (9.7 in.), not including input tray
when centered using visual guides
Recommended PC Configuration INTEL ATOM D525/D2550, 1.8 GHx, 2 GB RAM
x 2.56 in.); Minimum width: 50.8 mm (2.0 in.) Max. / Min. (2 in.)
Max. / Min. mode)
Maximum/Minimum (2 in.)
Maximum/Minimum mode)
Long Document Mode Length Up to 4.6m (180˝)
Minimum 63.5 mm (2.5˝ x 2.5˝)
Paper Thickness and Weight With standard feeder: 45 g/m2 (12 lb.) bond to 200 g/m2 (110 lb.) index With ultra-lightweight feeder accessory: 25 g/m2 (7 lb.) bond | https://www.centillionss.com/risk-management-services/audit-services/ |
According to Forbes, Kromtech found that Ashley Madison, a dating site where adulterous spouses can connect with other married people looking for some extramarital action, has left users’ private photos exposed through a logical flaw in its default data settings. Dec 7, 2017
The site won’t ask for your name; instead, it will ask you to provide a unique username as your identification. This photo illustration taken on August 20, 2013 shows the homepage of the Ashley Madison dating website displayed on a laptop in Hong Kong. The founder of a dating service promoting adultery is setting his sights on China’s cheating hearts after a controversial launch in Hong Kong. Ashley Madison was the subject of an investigation by the Federal Trade Commission in 2015 for a data breach that exposed more than 36 million customers’ private information and discovered the site using computer programs to impersonate women and engage men subscribers.
On 18th and 20th of August, the group leaked more than 25 gigabytes of company data, including user details. Ashley Madison today is about so much more than infidelity. In fact, a large number of our millions of members around the globe are singles drawn to the site because they want the kind of discretion Ashley Madison has been synonymous with for over a decade. Many members are in fulfilling relationships and need a safe place to explore polyamory together. Others still are looking for same-sex relationships but want to keep it separate from their personal and professional networks.
What followed is familiar territory now. The slow-motion car crash as the database was published online, load by load. The websites where nervous spouses could search for details of their partners. The divorce bonanza.
How much does it cost to send a message on Ashley Madison?
Don’t forget it costs money to use Ashley Madison as a man: you have to spend credits to send messages to people, and credits cost dollars – 100 credits will set you back $49.Aug 27, 2015
Indeed, the last year at Ashley Madison has focused on rebuilding user trust in part in the wake of the 2015 scandal. The company hired a new chief privacy officer and chief security officer who have been in charge of building a new cybersecurity framework.
Does Ashley Madison use bots?
(despite dropping it in 2016). In fact, Ashley Madison has been growing. It now claims 191,000 daily active users. While Ashley Madison was once outed for conning users with female bots, via a probe by the Federal Trade Commission, its comeback includes a “no bots” promise. Apr 4, 2018
They are students, stay-at-home moms and dads, office workers, tradespeople, entrepreneurs, retirees, and everyone in between. Sexual orientation, relationship status, age, wealth, and religion are unimportant here.
Ashley Madison is not your typical dating site.
But then I ended up feeling that way in my marriage.
Ashley Madison has hung on, though, signing up new members and refocusing on security.
Visiting a “bad” website could allow cybercriminals to try to attack the weak spots in your computer’s browser or other software and exploit them to deposit code that takes over your computer –OR – the website could convince you to enter personal information that you definitely don’t want cybercriminals to have (usernames, passwords, etc.). Ashley Madison offers a discreet and anonymous billing. To check how it will appear on your account, visit the ‘Buy Credits’ or ‘Subscribe’ section.
Then I started wondering if it was my fault he’d canceled because the day before I’d sent him some pictures of me and my dog and he hadn’t responded. I felt like maybe that was being too clingy. Or, I don’t know, just asking too much of him, like I was saying, Hey, I’m an actual person, look at me, look at my dog, and maybe he didn’t want that?
Has Ashley Madison been taken down?
The Impact Team announced the attack on 15 July 2015 and threatened to expose the identities of Ashley Madison’s users if its parent company, Avid Life Media, did not shut down Ashley Madison and its sister site, “Established Men”.
In July, 2015, employees at the world’s most controversial dating site logged onto their systems to find a message from the “Impact Team.” The site had been hacked. And the extraordinarily sensitive data of tens of millions was suddenly at risk. | http://www.alfonsoriva.org/lessons-to-be-learned-from-the-ashley-madison-data-breach/ |
I'm watching HarmonTown, alone, on my weekend. And I'm thinking about what it's like to not look to be in terribly great shape, to have facial hair, to be middle-aged, and to have clearly failed to build a family to grow old with. HarmonTown is about Dan Harmon, one of the misfit nerds who created shows like Community and Rick and Morty, which shows entertain and touch us similarly-spirited people on a deeper level than we can quite explain. We are filled with utter delight when Harmon, or Kevin Smith, or someone like that, depicts or talks about something that's an important part of our lives, but that previously hadn't really existed, as far as TVtonia and MovieLand were concerned.
I can watch documentaries like this one, and I can pretend to be outside of it. I can "diagnose" or profile the guys in them: fat, smart, sensitive guys, who are still close with their mothers, who love animals, who tend to have messy/long hair and beards, who love fantasy and worlds of imagination and a mix of cerebral humour with potty jokes. Sometimes trying to get tough with tattoos and piercings, but still looking baby soft. Man-children. Nerds. Trekkers. Middle-aged men who collect toys and games from their childhoods, which childhoods they claim were pretty unhappy, but for those things they're collecting. Whatever. Mostly lonely people who are part of our culture's ever-expanding vista of solitude and social alienation leading up to lonely death.
But I'm watching me, really. And a whole lot of people I know.
There's a real sense in all of it of feeling like one has failed to grow up. Hasn't managed to adult. (Also... feeling like growing up would really suck.) Because (Biff! Pam! Pow!) comic books may have "grown up" enough to really make an impressive annual salary, but many of us who used to read them haven't.
And why would we? Is there any reason other than "I have kids" to stop living like them? Kids imagine. They aren't held responsible to make a real home, or a real life. They can make up elaborate fantasy worlds together and play in them. They can argue for hours about which house they'd be in at Hogwarts, or what race they'd be in Middle-earth. If they have special allergies, conditions, syndromes or needs, they just get more and more attention and stuff. They've got no one to fool, really. So they generally tell you straight up what they're thinking and feeling, without being afraid you will judge them.
Grown up people aren't like that. They don't share like that. They can't afford to be vulnerable like that. They need to maintain the illusion of adulthood. Unlike some of us, they were no doubt raised that the "white lie" is absolutely essential to getting by in society.
So, if you do share vulnerability, or tell your real feelings, people tend to say it's so brave. But really, they're thinking it's crazy. A bad move. Because it's a Really Bad Idea to be vulnerable. You have a persona to maintain. Be vulnerable and open, let the mask slip and get seen for more of who you really are, and you might wreck it all. (this is not taking into account those not-really-being-human folks who aren't aware of having anything at all under that mask they paint daily. Because what can be said about them?) Many adults are so adult they never let even themselves see a clear glimpse of what's going on behind their personas/roles.
For some of us though, sharing and being vulnerable isn't risking anything much. Because we have conclusively failed to fool anyone with any kind of adult, successful, strong, competent, respectable, unbothered, content, relationship-worthy persona to begin with.
In fact, we failed so badly at making one, that others around us make charity loaner personas for us to wear if we're going to be meeting their real friends. Roles they hand to us at the door for us to put on, which personas they tossed together because we clearly need one. Personas that include the idea that we need to be "explained." That we Won't Ever Get It. That we Won't Change. Personas that do the very opposite of what theirs do for them. Personas that tell everyone "He's not fine just the way he is, but tell him he's great, ok?" Personas they hand us that it would be an utter delight to wreck utterly.
"This is Tom. He's very negative, but he's just being so very funny. We just laugh. He doesn't mean any harm. He's single, but he won't date my fat cousin even though he's fat himself. He has a speech impediment, so don't comment on what accent you think he has. "This is Bob. He's a computer guy. Builds computers in his basement and all of his friends are computers. And he loves spicy food. Like, to an unhealthy degree. I hope he doesn't say anything sexist. He doesn't drink coffee or tea. Likely on prozac or something like that. "This is Tim. He's kind of autistic? Like, not literally, but kind of... you know. And we don't think he's gay, but he hasn't dated anyone since we've known him. And he loves those movies with swords and magic, but doesn't watch sports. Like, ever. So he won't really talk about hockey or football or anything in a normal way." Apparently we need disclaimers. "The following interaction may include mature conversations that get real and go beyond the niceties of small talk. Viewer discretion is advised."
Mostly they get us very, very wrong, and mostly it really doesn't matter to them. People just need to feel like they've got a handle on us. "Guy who eats only tacos and has three cats. Got it." Even if that was you for one summer at age 15, and it was part of a contest, and your one cat died five years ago.
The mysterious thing is that anyone who looks at you and talks to you for about two minutes can see pretty much everything important about you. It's not like you're mysterious or hard to figure out. But it's like they are still having trouble believing who you are. Because you aren't quite like them, in small ways. So you're confusing to them. You've got to be something other than how you come off, don't you? Because surely no one is actually how they come off? Just...
But maybe you don't know to feel the shame or try to hide anything about what you are. You don't know how to "get along," or "play the game" or "work the angles" or "put your best foot forward." You put whichever foot is next forward. Left after right. In whatever shoes you happened to put on. Maybe you knowingly and unknowingly commit any number of social faux pas, and it's not really worth it to you to bother with any of it. It's not like "playing the game" is going to make you win it in any appreciable sense. It's not like you're a courtier in the palace of Louis XIV of France. So you don't bother with a persona nearly as much as everyone else. Don't have a corner of your brain that's working all day long, automatically helping you total up things that make you look good or win points with others. So they treat you like someone without a face who therefore needs a mask handed to him at the door.
They're different. They fake smiles, and cultivate a cute little vocabulary of evasions, non-answers and readily deniable, only half-said things. They know how to hint at their feelings and thoughts without committing to them in any way that one might be able to build on in future conversations. Because they've got too much built to risk their own personas through being known more fully. To let the personality past the PR men. What would happen if people saw through their personas to the rest of them? They might stand out. Be harder to integrate into social events. What pass for their friends right now might start forgetting to invite them to things. It might just be easier for everyone that way.
Well, for many of us, we don't have all that stuff to lose. We look up the social hierarchy to those just above us, who have families and lovely homes and cottages and back yards, and who have occasionally invited us to them to do things, instead of just to bars, and often we know that they won't be continuing to include us. Why? Mostly because, in a hierarchy like that, if you even slightly piss off any one person who is higher up than you are (especially if they are part of both "A Couple," and also "A Family Whose Kids Play With Our Kids") you drop out of the running. We can't help wishing we could fit, but we can't and won't change anything to try to fit. We're pretty sure there's no use in thinking about it.
Family gets prioritized over friendship. Every time. (Or you lose your family.) So, even if you have forged a number of strong friendships in your 20s, you can very rapidly lose those once your friends have families that then "outrank" you. And if any of your closest friends start living with someone who'd prefer you don't come around too much, perhaps having her own friends she'd rather have around, you've not going to be coming around much anymore. That's it for you. They've graduated. You haven't.
(Of course you can always hope they'll break up and then you'll be persona mucho grata again, but that doesn't always work out either.)
We singletons also look "across" the social hierarchy to people who are managing to get by while being a lot like us, but who also seem to have some kind of group. And these things are precious to us. Often, we either can't really get/fit into these bands, clubs, teams, clubs and relationships to begin with ("Thanks for auditioning. We'll call you.") Or these groups kind of fall apart due to internal stressors. We have to really watch we don't tear our little islands of being-with-other-people apart over petty stuff. ("petty" is from the French word "petit(e)" for "small/unimportant.")
And we look down the social hierarchy to those just below us who are un(der)employed and perhaps still living with their parents, or on social assistance, and who definitely have no kids or connections either. And we hang out with them. And when they meet our friends? We're tempted to "explain" them. After all, they're single. And have no jobs. So we try.
And then we realize we're just as bad as everyone else at playing the game. At climbing. There are just different weight classes of playing the game. And some of us are middle-weights trying to move up and lacking what it takes.
"Thanks for your... most interesting audition! We'll call you!" | http://wikkidthoughts.blogspot.ca/2017/09/vulnerability-and-forthrightnes-are-for.html |
A controversial provision in U.S. law that gives the National Security Agency broad authority to spy on people overseas expires at the end of the year, and six major tech trade groups are gearing up for a fight over an extension.
Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act expires on Dec. 31, and Congress almost certain to extend it in some form.
The tech trade groups, including BSA, the Consumer Technology Association, and the Computer and Communications Industry Association, are asking lawmakers to build in new privacy protections for internet users.
“It is critical that Congress takes a balanced yet focused approach with respect to Section 702,” the groups said in a letter sent to top lawmakers Wednesday. “We urge your committees to ensure that any reauthorization includes meaningful safeguards for internet users’ privacy and civil liberties.”
Section 702 of FISA allows the NSA to spy on the communications, including internet traffic, of people living outside the U.S. and, in some cases, their communications to people living inside the country. FISA served as the authority for the NSA’s Prism internet surveillance and other programs revealed by NSA leaker Edward Snowden.
The trade groups didn’t offer specific recommendations for privacy and civil liberties protections, although they called on Congress to hold a public debate on an extension of the provision.
The position of the tech trade groups differs from many digital rights groups, who want Congress to either make major changes to the provision or scrap it.
“Section 702 of FISA has allowed for mass surveillance programs … that have been used by the U.S. government to warrantlessly collect and search the Internet communications of people all over the world,” the End 207 coalition said. “Absent a full reform,” Section 702 should be allowed to expire.
The NSA and other U.S. intelligence agencies have defended FISA as essential to protect the U.S. from terrorism and other security threats. NSA surveillance has helped to thwart dozens of terrorism plots, Matthew Olsen, an executive with IronNet Cybersecurity and former director of the National Counterterrorism Center, said during a hearing last May.
The surveillance programs are “vital to our security,” Olsen said then. The programs allow the U.S. government to “obtain critical intelligence about terrorists and other targets that it simply could not obtain by other means.” | https://www.pcworld.com/article/412088/tech-groups-gear-up-for-fisa-surveillance-fight.html |
Ahead of the five-year anniversary of NotPetya (June 27th), cybersecurity leaders from Gigamon, DigitalXRAID and CYFOR Secure have weighed in on what has changed, and how organisations can protect against future large-scale ransomware attacks.
Mark Coates, VP EMEA, Gigamon says, “In the five years since NotPetya, the threat from ransomware has become both critical and unpredictable. And with organisations scrambling to implement the latest technologies and processes to protect their IT infrastructure, they’re not always getting it right.”
Mark Pitts began his career as a locksmith in the mid 90s, and in 2003 got into physical and keyless security. Industries served include hospitals, military bases, schools, colleges, churches, convenient stores and insurance agencies.
Mark holds certifications in access control, cctv, automatic operators and limited energy electrical license. | https://jpcsecurity.com/cybersecurity-pioneers-share-their-views-on-how-organisations-can-protect-against-future-large-scale-ransomware-attacks/ |
Building and maintaining customer trust is a fundamental aspect of running a successful business. In the past, doing so was a straightforward operation for honest business leaders.
However, in today’s world, the internet has opened even the most well-intentioned companies to attacks specifically designed to expose that customer information. Businesses that utilize the power of the internet have an increasingly complex responsibility to build an effective security strategy.
In the old days, building a security plan may have been as simple as locking a safe. Today, security plans must weave technology and processes together to overcome the web of complicated external regulations, software and hardware choices, and internal policy design. To add even more complexity, requirements, regulations, and the threats used by cyber criminals evolve regularly.
5. Review Third Party Security Programs
Finally, companies need to ensure that third party vendors have acceptable security programs and develop a process to review those programs at regular intervals. Many recent hacks have occurred because third parties have had subpar security standards. Target fell victim through an HVAC vendor while Sonic exposed customer credit card information because of inadequate security protocols at one of their card processors. Regulators are beginning to hold companies responsible for the mistakes of their partners and customers certainly will by shopping elsewhere.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This infographic is inspired by the recommendations made in the financial services white paper written by Keith Lockwood and Garrett Silver, CEO of Critical Informatics. | https://criticalinformatics.com/resources/blog/5-building-blocks-of-an-effective-cybersecurity-program/ |
This is a guest post by Brandon Valeriano and Ryan Maness.
Cyberwar is a pressing international security problem. The news media breathlessly covers any potential attack before the facts are in. Policy briefs and reports are produced on all levels of government and private industry. It would then behoove us to take a step back and examine opinions about the cyber security threat according to perceptions among policymakers, academics, and cyber security experts in order to understand how the threat emanating from the cyber security realm is constructed in the public discourse. Each constituency has its own view on the issue and how these views manifest is critical to perceptions about the wider societal threat coming from cyberspace.
According to Allison’s bureaucratic model of politics, where you sit in government determines where you stand or what opinions you have. Through surveys we can see that process play out. It is in the interest of cyber security experts to inflate the cyber threat. It is also in the interests of the news media to breathlessly hype up cyber fears to gain more page views. The threat of cyberwar is a real and pressing threat, but constrained by institutions and systems that limit the damage the tactic can do. Just how serious this threat is perceived can be predicted by one’s institutional setting and standard operating procedures.
On January 30, 2012, technological experts from around the globe were surveyed by McAfee and the Security and Defense Agenda (SDA) about the issue of cyberwar. Fifty-seven percent of these practitioners believe that states are currently engaged in a cyber “arms race.” It is unclear what a cyber arms race really is in this context (the raw data from the survey is not online) but the general idea is that capabilities and the threat from this issue area are increasing at all levels. Other findings in the survey are just as troubling and mystifying. Forty-three percent believe the worst case scenario, damage and disruption to a state’s critical infrastructure is also the most likely. A further forty five percent believe that cyber-security is just as pressing an issue as border security. Apparently, the great powers such as the US, UK, and Germany are lacking in their “cyber-readiness” when compared to smaller states such as Israel and Sweden mainly because they fail to share information internally rather than having any specific deterrent capabilities, at least according to the McAfee report.
With these opinions in mind, the SDA asked respondents which actions should be taken to curb this newest threat to international security. Opinions on the next course of action are just as troubling as the survey results. Apparently, a “global information sharing network should be established by states.” This is an odd perspective in that cyber threats are not uniform across states and centralizing the network could put states in a more vulnerable position. The next idea is to provide “financial incentives for improvements in security in both the private and public sectors.” An interesting proposal advocating bribery to improve networks much in the same way a parent bribes a child to do their homework. Finally, “diplomats need to start addressing this issue with more urgency,” with the help of cyber security experts (the subjects of the survey) of course. I would guess the next step is for a color coded cyber terror warning indicator (I suggest the highest threat be the color of Mountain Dew in order to honor the true cyber warriors – teenage hackers and computer programmers).
Why would the majority of cyber security practitioners argue for such expensive, expansive, and urgent measures when the biggest attack, arguably Stuxnet, required a physical injection of software to take effect? Clearly there is an interest to promote this threat in the cyber security community.
In contrast, the TRIP survey asked a sample of academics from U.S. universities “What are the top foreign policy problems facing the United States?” They were pitted against practitioners within the U.S. government who work within the national security apparatus (PDF). Academics deemed cybersecurity the least pressing foreign policy problem with only eight percent suggesting it is a top problem. This falls right behind the fear of oil reliance (12%) and global poverty (12%). Policymakers rank cybersecurity nearly as low as academics with 17 percent finding this a top foreign policy problem right above the issue of climate change (eight percent), global poverty (three percent), and oil reliance (four percent).
Academics find cybersecurity one of the least pressing threats in the system and policymakers tend to agree generally. So why is cybersecurity such a pressing issue according to the news media and cyber security practitioners? One might argue that cyber security practitioners know the reality better than academics and policymakers; suggesting their warnings about the coming cyber threat is just a harbinger to the future. Using the bureaucratic politics model, others might conclude that the cyber security industry is a biased party whose interests lie in promoting the cyber threat. The news media just parrots these perspectives because the quotes come easy and the news stories prey on the fear the average citizen holds towards technology. The danger in declaring cyberwar a ‘top threat’ comes from distracting our attention from more pressing problems like collapsing states, human rights abuses, the proliferation of terrorism and WMDs, and internal violence in the form of civil war. Cyberwar is a dangerous issue in contemporary security politics, but it is nowhere near the top threat facing the United States. | https://www.duckofminerva.com/2013/01/perceptions-and-opinions-of-the-cyber-threat.html |
In recent time you may heard that cybercriminals are selling different types of personal, self assessment data online and sometimes they post it online also. Once any sensitive data is public in the internet, this is very much impossible to get rid of that. The internet is made of many and many layers of servers etc. To conduct the recoveries you may seen that your web application needs to be get password reset after sometimes.
Using DLP techniques you can organize and keep your sensitive data not to be published and accessible easily for others. You can often use different types of software to keep the sensitive data safe of your personal life and your organizations also. The key approaches to take the DLP in real life needs to take on :
Making proper identifications of the data is sensitive or not.
Giving user access information properly and constantly monitoring and controlling endpoint activities.
Keeping checkpoint that which data is uploaded to any listed malicious website or cloud applications or not.
Making dashboard and reports to make easy visualization of the status of data and keeping your organization to cyber rule compliant with government agencies.
Putting the practice of end-to end data encryption.
The cybersecurity can be compromised from the inside also. This type of User and Bots behavior analysis over the network can help you to understand the daily data usage pattern and the how data usage changes in weekly basis and even daily basis. Machine learning based applications for these type of analysis are becoming common in the IT infrastructure. They are coming inbuilt functionality of the networking devices like routers.
Keep yourself updated with the latest gadgets, tech news! Join our Facebook, Follow our Twitter for regular updates. | https://leanshelf.com/5-cybersecurity-tech-reshaping-digital-transformation-in-india/ |
The familiarity of web bugs maybe some image that tracks some users when they open an email, these features work using unique embedding URL in a page image which creates a TAG and generates an incoming GET request.
Those are the principles of Canary Tokens, the application of the previously described aspect applied to file reads or queries database, the execution of queries or maybe to detect a pattern within log files. Canary tokens can be used to implant traps in every area located within your structure or production system which is more efficient than just setting separate honeypots as a beacon.
Technical details:
Network breaches happen more often nowadays, this problem can affect small businesses even large mega-corps, what is trying to be protected and be avoided with the implementation of these tokens is to find out immediately which kind of users are attempting to break out into our system.
Canary tokens are available for free in http://canarytokens.org you can download your own token to send a notification to your personal email whenever someone is trying to reach or open any specific file that you put into your network.
If an unauthorized user or an attacker uses the token that you have placed into your network, Canary will give you an out of band email that the token has been opened.
At last, Canary provides a variety of tools and hints that increase the possibility of an attacker to trip over the token.
Demonstration of Usage:
As we mentioned before you can visit the site: http://canarytokens.org and select which type of Honeypot you want to add into your workspace they can vary the options available from different options as it can be seen in the picture shown below:
After you select the type of token you want to use, you can add a description for the notification that is going to be sent to your email and you can click into “Create my CanaryToken” for the token to be created. This process can be seen in the picture below:
After we click on Create my Canarytoken the page is going to show you the address for the token, in this case, we selected a Microsoft Word Document, the page will allow you download the file and change the name to be more appealing for any attacker which may access into our computer. The download page can be visualized in the picture below:
Now we download the file and change the name of the file to a name that represents the store of delicate data like the one shown in the picture below:
We open the file and see that’s empty but the token was already activated. We check into the email address that we selected to receive the notification to see if canary send a notification for unauthorized access to our token.
As we can see CanaryToken represents a free and easy solution to set Honeypots across your work environment and control the execution of some features within your network, it represents a helpful defensive tool against possible threats and helpful framework to keep a record of possible threats that may affect your data integrity or the privacy of your files. | https://infosecaddicts.com/easy-honeypots-canary-tokens/ |
Cylance launched Cylance Smart Antivirus, AI-powered antivirus software designed for consumers. By extending the enterprise-grade AI of CylancePROTECT into the home, Cylance provides internet users with security software that predicts and blocks threats.
More than 350,000 new pieces of malware are created every day, and traditional consumer antivirus software can’t keep pace with today’s security reality. Existing solutions rely on reactive, signature-based technologies that slow down systems, bombard users with pop-up notifications, and require some form of breach in order to begin detecting malware.
The exponential growth of malicious code, especially zero-day threats and ransomware, requires solutions to adequately and effectively protect end-users.
To help consumers stay ahead of bad actors, Cylance Smart Antivirus provides predictive security to spot and block threats before they have a chance to run without affecting device performance or disrupting the user.
“Consumers deserve security software that is fast, easy to use, and effective,” said Christopher Bray, senior vice president, Cylance Consumer. “The consumer antivirus market is long overdue for a groundbreaking solution built on robust technology that allows them to control their security environment.”
With Cylance Smart Antivirus, everyday internet users now have the option to purchase software built on artificial intelligence.
Many people have experience with legacy products that are only as good as their last update. Such tools require manual interactions such as downloads, installations, reboots, and scans.
Cylance Smart Antivirus is offering an set-it-and-forget-it security experience that gives consumers peace of mind and ease of use. Key features include:
Predictive threat prevention: With its AI-driven approach, Cylance Smart Antivirus is designed to stop malicious threats, including malware variants.
Minimal impact on performance: Cylance Smart Antivirus runs silently and constantly without degradation of device performance, diminishing the constant pop-ups, scan requests, and bloatware features that characterize existing AV solutions.
Effortless user experience: Easy to install and manage, Cylance Smart Antivirus automatically updates in the background for a set-it-and-forget-it security experience. Users can get up and running in minutes, without unnecessary updates or reboots.
Visibility: Cylance Smart Antivirus empowers the technical expert in any family with full awareness and control of the security status of all devices regardless of device location. An easy-to-use web dashboard lets users set alerts if an attack has been blocked, monitor the status of protected devices, and view lists of malicious files blocked on each device.
Simple pricing: Cylance Smart Antivirus offers fair and transparent pricing. Unlike many vendors that steeply discount the first year of usage only to surprise consumers with auto-renewals at much higher rates, Cylance discounts subsequent years of use to encourage and reward long-term security hygiene. | https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2018/07/13/cylance-smart-antivirus/ |
DALLAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 8, 2019- Zix Corporation(Zix) (NASDAQ: ZIXI), a leader in email security, has acquired the assets of Cirius Messaging Inc. and wholly owned subsidiary, DeliverySlip Inc. related to the DeliverySlip product. DeliverySlip is a provider of email encryption, e-signatures and secure file sharing solutions. Total cash consideration for the transaction is $14 million, payable in various stages between closing and October 2020. The asset acquisition immediately improves the margin profile of the business by eliminating the third party royalty payable by AppRiver to DeliverySlip. In addition, it will add large file transfer capabilities to Zix’s email security suite, as well as additional customers, cost savings, and cross-selling opportunities.
“With more than 90% of DeliverySlip’s revenue coming from AppRiver, we recognized the importance of executing this acquisition to eliminate any potential disruption to our partners and customers and to drive further cost savings and cross-selling opportunities,” said David Wagner, Zix’s Chief Executive Officer. “In addition to the cost savings of eliminating third-party royalties for the DeliverySlip solutions, the acquisition will enable our partners and customers to move forward with one comprehensive suite of email security solutions that will be integrated over time. It further provides an opportunity to generate higher attach rates with the cross-sell of large file transfer and document signing solutions to Zix’s installed base. Not including potential cross-selling opportunities, we expect the transaction to add approximately $2 million of adjusted EBITDA in 2020.”
DeliverySlip serves 5 million+ users across 11,000+ organizations worldwide. With a particular focus on compliance-oriented industries, DeliverySlip has built a robust data protection platform encompassing emails, large files, web forms, apps, and electronic signatures and approvals. | https://www.securemailencryption.com/54826/zix-acquires-the-assets-of-email-security-provider-deliveryslip |
In the fast-paced, modern world in which we now live, businesses have to keep up with technology simply to stay afloat. They need to make sure they have the latest website designs, the latest software and the most robust security software and procedures available on the market, and there’s so much variety that it’s hard to figure out what your business really needs and what will just clog up your processes and reduce your efficiency, as there are so many programs out there offering options for which you have no need. The companies that figure out what is more beneficial to them and their customers, are the companies that beat their competition and rise above the rest. But it’s hard to know what you should be looking for from your software and devices, and that’s why InfoStream are offering expert advice and assessments to businesses in the Lake Worth, Jupiter and West Palm Beach areas.
InfoStream are a business IT services provider who have worked alongside some superstars of the technology industry, including Microsoft, Dell, Trend, Cisco and GFI, so they know exactly how the industry changes and evolves, and they’ve learnt from some of the best so that they can bring the best value and advice to their customers. They don’t just help customers within the IT sector either; InfoStream extend their services to businesses from a wide range of industries, including (but not limited to): accounting & finance, architectural & engineering, legal, manufacturing, not-for-profit & charitable, real estate, education and construction.
Computer support comes from InfoStream in various forms; as well as the consultations with technology professionals (which are free!), you can get them to repair your laptops, pcs and other hardware, or you can enlist their highly-trained staff to maintain or recover your computer networking systems, so that your business can continue to run smoothly. Additionally, InfoStream offer IT department outsourcing (should you prefer to leave your network in the hands of the professionals), Cloud networking and storage (so that your valuable data can be kept safe, away from the harm of fires, intruders or any other unexpected incident) and they’ll also make your company completely PCI-compliant, giving your valued customers another reason to buy from you rather than from your competitors. You can even enlist the knowledgeable staff at InfoStream to train yours so that they know how to make the most of your new software set-up.
You can take your first step towards future-proofing your company by requesting a free Full Network Audit & Security Scan and a free Critical Health Checklist from InfoStream’s website, at www.infostream.cc. On the website you can also sign up for a free email newsletter, so that you can get all of the latest tech industry developments delivered straight into your inbox, or you can call them up and get talking to one of their helpful advisers on (561) 968-0046, who can also provide you with technical support, should you need it. | https://www.infostream.cc/2013/07/future-proof-your-business-through-your-computer-network/ |
Statement from Sen. Bongbong Marcos
The Cyber Crime Bill has been passed into law and that is it for now. The Committee Report that I signed did not contain the Libel Clause. The records will show that when the Libel Clause was introduced and approved on the same day, I was away on “official business.” This is no time to make excuses nor to blame anyone for what I cannot agree to with regards the Libel Clause. Having said that, I would rather be accused of a lapse in supervision than not do anything to correct it. The internet as a whole and the numerous ways it is used including social networks such as this one, has been something close to my heart. I have been a netizen since the early 90’s when “dial-up” was the way to log on and I have watched it grow and I have seen it as a tool for the empowerment of people to air their grievances, share information, gather information, and communicate in “real time” and thus, participate directly in bettering society for the good of all mankind. I have had my share of libelous attacks both in traditional media and in cybermedia but that is a small thing for me to consider compared to the benefits a free internet brings to all of us. It will be a fatal mistake to muzzle our voices in this medium that is the most democratic and empowering to the individual that technology has given to us. I do not suggest that we “throw the baby out with the bath water,” but the Libel Clause must be amended and free speech upheld. I will file a bill to that effect and support all efforts made in the same direction.
WOW..I salute the senator if he could do some amendments that would prevent DEMOCRACY to be in question so that Freedom of Speech can still be enliven but of course our responsibility to take into consideration to practice Ethics in Information technology. | https://airwindzone.wordpress.com/2012/10/03/sen-bongbong-marcos-on-the-cyber-crime-law/ |
Ransomware is a type of malware that encrypts a victim’s files and demands a ransom be paid in order to decrypt them. Ransomware attacks can be especially damaging to businesses, as they can result in extensive downtime and lost data.
There are many different types of ransomware, and new strains are constantly being developed. Some of the most common include:
CryptoLocker: This strain of ransomware was first seen in 2013 and quickly became one of the most prevalent forms of ransomware. CryptoLocker typically spreads via email attachments or malicious links. WannaCry: WannaCry is a ransomware strain that emerged in 2017. It quickly spread around the world, affecting hundreds of thousands of computers in 150 countries. WannaCry spreads through a vulnerability in Microsoft’s Windows operating system and encrypts the victim’s files. It then demands a ransom be paid in Bitcoin in order to decrypt the files.
NotPetya: It shares many similarities with WannaCry, but is more sophisticated and destructive. Once installed, it will encrypt the victim’s files and demand a ransom be paid in Bitcoin or another cryptocurrency in order to decrypt them.
What are the consequences of a ransomware attack?
Ransomware attacks can have devastating consequences for businesses. They can result in significant financial losses, as well as downtime and data loss. In some cases, businesses have been forced to pay the ransom in order to decrypt their files. In addition, ransomware attacks can damage a business’s reputation and customers may lose trust in the company. Ransomware can also spread to other computers on the network, causing further damage.
How can businesses protect themselves from ransomware attacks?
There are a number of steps businesses can take to protect themselves from ransomware attacks. These include:
Educating employees about the dangers of ransomware and how to avoid it.
Backing up data regularly and storing backups offline.
Using strong security software, including antivirus and antimalware.
Keeping operating systems and software up to date with the latest security patches.
Restricting access to sensitive data and files.
Restoring from backups: If the business has backups, they can be used to restore the encrypted files.
Do not pay the ransom: There is no guarantee that paying the ransom will actually lead to the files being decrypted. In addition, it may encourage the attackers to target other businesses.
Hiring a cybersecurity firm: A cybersecurity firm can help businesses assess the damage from a ransomware attack and take steps to recover from it.
When it comes to ransomware attacks, businesses need to be prepared. By taking some simple steps, they can reduce the chances of being attacked and minimize the damage if they are attacked. | https://www.roboearth.org/5-immediate-steps-to-take-after-a-ransomware-attack/ |
Why data center security matters in a world where cyberattacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated.
How IO delivers data center security better than the status quo.
What the “digital dragon” is and what you need to think about.
What to ask a potential data center provider so you can be assured of a secure data center. | http://www.itprotoday.com/business-resources/data-center-insecure-world |
Despite the significant Java security improvements made by Oracle during the past six months, Java vulnerabilities continue to represent a major security risk for organizations because most of them have outdated versions of the software installed on their systems, according to a report by security firm Bit9.
Bit9’s report was released Thursday and is based on data about Java usage collected from approximately 1 million enterprise endpoint systems owned by almost 400 organizations that use the company’s software reputation service.
The data shows that Java 6 is the most prevalent major version of Java in enterprise environments, present on more than 80 percent of enterprise computers that have Java installed.
Java 6 reached the end of public support in April, and only Oracle customers with a long-term support contract will continue to receive security updates for it. Java 7, the version that is the focus of Oracle’s recent security strengthening efforts, was only found on around 15 percent of endpoint systems sampled by Bit9.
Furthermore, most companies that run Java 6 on their systems don’t have the latest security updates for it, the security firm found.
The most widely deployed Java version, according to Bit9’s data, was Java 6 Update 20, which was installed on a little over 9 percent of endpoints. This version of Java is vulnerable to a total of 215 security issues, 96 of which have the maximum impact score on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) scale, Bit9 said.
The last publicly available security update for Java 6 is Java 6 Update 45, which was released in April at the same time as Java 7 Update 21, the latest version of Java available when Bit9 collected data for its report.
Only 3 percent of enterprise endpoint systems were running Java 7 Update 21, the company said. However, those endpoints belonged to only 0.25 percent of the sampled organizations, which seems to indicate that organizations with a larger number of endpoints are more likely to have the latest version of Java installed on their systems.
Another issue is that many enterprise systems have multiple versions of Java running on them. Around 42 percent of systems had more than two versions of Java installed at the same time, and approximately 20 percent had more than three versions.
According to Bit9’s report, on average, organizations have more than 50 distinct versions of Java installed in their environments. About 5 percent of organizations have more than 100 versions.
This problem mainly stems from how the Java installation and updating process deals with older versions.
The Java 7 updater will attempt to remove existing installations of Java 6, but a clean installation of Java 7 won’t remove older versions, said Harry Sverdlove, Bit9’s chief technology officer. Java 5 versions are not removed during Java 7’s installation or update processes, he said.
The Bit9 data showed that 93 percent of organizations have a version of Java on some of their systems that’s at least five years old. Fifty-one percent have a version that’s between five and 10 years old.
The problem with having multiple versions of Java installed at the same time on a system is that attackers can target the older and vulnerable versions to hack into that computer. Once that happens, the security of the newer Java versions doesn’t help.
Code that enumerates all Java versions installed on a system for reconnaissance purposes has already been seen in real attacks, Bit9 said in the report.
Having different Java versions on a system increases usability because customers can run legacy applications, but from a security perspective it’s a nightmare, Sverdlove said. Every version that is installed introduces yet another set of known vulnerabilities that attackers can target, he said.
Sverdlove compared the situation of companies running five-to-10-year-old versions of Java to running Windows 95. This practice might be convenient for compatibility reasons, but it’s a horrible security risk, he said.
In most cases, this kind of Java version fragmentation inside enterprise environments is probably not even intentional, as many companies don’t understand or keep track of how many versions they have installed, Sverdlove said.
First and foremost, organizations should get an assessment of what Java versions they have in their environments and where, Sverdlove said. The next step should be for them, as a matter of security policy, to stop and seriously consider whether they need Java, and if they do, for what purposes, he said.
The results of this assessment will vary among organizations, Sverdlove said. Some companies might find that a particular version of Java is needed to run legacy applications, but only on certain computers. Others might discover that certain websites that require Java work with the latest version of the software, and some might find that Java is only needed on their servers and not on desktops, he said.
Regardless of their individual Java needs, organizations should create a Java deployment policy and enforce it, Sverdlove said. If their policy is to not have Java, then they should use tools to block it from running; if they determine that they only need Java on certain machines, then they should remove it from all other machines, he said.
The most common way for hackers to attack Java installations is through the software’s Web browser plug-ins by using exploits hosted on websites.
The Bit9 report did not contain specific information about how many of the Java installations identified on enterprise endpoints were accessible through the Web browsers on those computers. However, the majority of the sampled endpoint systems were desktops and laptops, so the likelihood of those Java installations being exposed to Web attacks is high, Sverdlove said.
Updated 7/18/13 at 11:50 A.M ET to correct a percentage error in the 9th paragraph. | https://www.pcworld.com/article/452944/most-enterprise-networks-riddled-with-vulnerable-java-installations-report-says.html |
Sets the application Ivec used by Crypto.encode(3kaya) and Crypto.decode(3kaya) to a new value for the remainder of program execution. You can obtain the key from a variety of sources (e.g. a flat file, or a database entry) - the easiest way is probably to read 16 bytes from a file with IO.getChar(3kaya)
The Ivec is not secret, but in some cases you may need it to be consistent.
Web applications should call this function from within their webconfig function to avoid unpredictable results. Also to avoid unpredictable results, this function may only be called once per program run, and must be called before any other function that uses the key. An Exception will be thrown if this is called for a second time or too late. | https://manpages.org/cryptosetencryptionivec/3 |
· Update AVG and run test of the Windows System folder to schedule the removal of the infected DLL/OCX library on computer restart.
· Restart computer, so the DLL/OCX file will be removed.
· Thereafter run the removal tool with parameter C: to heal the infected files. You can specify more drives (example: rmprepnd C: D:). | https://www.allsoftwareinfo.com/windows-antivirus/win32-prepender-remover-antivirus-and-spyware-for-windows/ |
The bits of RTM version are shown in central admin page with Build number “14.0.4762.1000” but it’s actually “14.0.4763.1000” - So no worry about 😉
In the Oct. 2010 CU a regression was detected but the problem is fixed and the packages are republished now as build 14.0.5128.5003
In the Dec. 2010 CU, a regression was found. "You cannot create an AD DS synchronization connection ... after Dec.CU 2010 installed... (KB 2490381)"
August 2012 CU for SharePoint 2010 and any later will only install on a server/farm which has SP1 installed. See here for the Latest SharePoint 2010 Service Pack 1 information!
If you also have Project Server 2010 in your farm, please get the full server package for project server from here: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/projectserver/gg176680
As usual, the SharePoint 2010 Products Configuration Wizard or "psconfig –cmd upgrade –inplace b2b -wait” should be executed on every server in the farm following the update installation.
The Build number shown in your central admin -> servers in farm's site is the version that comes from the configuration database (table dbo.versions).
package. For more information about these updates, click the following article numbers to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
2536601 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2536601/)
With the June 2011 CU package, there is also a new FIM release (ForeFront Identitiy Manager aka "missclient.exe") published.
Where before, the FIM showed up with version 4.0.2450.11, you'll after installing June 2011 CU notice, that it will come up now in version 4.0.2450.34 yet.
Previously unreleased fixes that were made specifically for this service pack. In addition to general product fixes, these fixes include improvements in stability, performance, and in security.
All the public updates that were released through June 2011, and all the cumulative updates that were released through April 2011.
3. Now you can install SP2 + any later released CU.
Note: Due to required changes to the Prerequisite Installer, Service Pack 2 cannot be slipstreamed into installation media for use with installation on Windows Server 2012 systems. Installation of SharePoint Server 2010 with Service Pack 2 on Windows Server 2012 systems requires an integrated Service Pack 2 installation media due following the patch release.
FAQ's: <updated: 2013-07-31>
Q: with the SharePoint 2010 June 2013 CU (KB2817527), and now the August 2013 CU (KB2817570), the server package includes a CAB file (ubersrv_1.CAB) in addition to the executable. Curious about the logic behind this change ...
A: Its because we are reaching a physical file size limit of 2GB. So it had to be split.
Cumulative update packages for Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 and Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 containing hotfixes for the issues that were fixed since the release of SharePoint foundation and SharePoint Server 2010. They are sometimes also called “Uber Package”.
After applying the preceding updates, run the SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration Wizard or “psconfig –cmd upgrade –inplace b2b -wait” in command line.
This needs to be done on all servers in the farm with SharePoint 2010 installed.
As usually, you should start with the server, hosting the central admin and finishing it there, after all other servers has been updated as well! The other servers now can run the psconfig wizard in parallel (on MOSS we had to run them sequentially, one by one).
For any given build you may find that it is not necessary to install a SharePoint Foundation 2010 update before you install a SharePoint Server 2010 update. This flexibility in the installation sequence is part of the software update system design. However, there might be times where it is necessary to remove this flexibility in order to properly fix a specific issue.
I personally recommend that you always install SharePoint Foundation 2010 patches before installing SharePoint Server 2010 patches. This best practice ensures that you will always be successful when installing updates and keeps you on the save side.
As per this Link now: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/ff800847.aspx
"...it is no longer necessary to install the SharePoint Foundation cumulative update and then install the SharePoint Server cumulative update."
Well yes, its true and you can do so if it is more applicable for your Environment. but I still may recommend to follow as above to keep the best consistency for any updates as well for future.
The language pack is installed in its native language. For example, the Russian language pack executable file is in Russian...
SharePoint Foundation 2010 language packs are not required for SharePoint Server 2010 (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262108.aspx)
The office Web apps are not like the SharePoint Server updates. They are mostly released either as a single hotfix/update, a security fix or sometimes even as a bulk pack.
So please consider to check via the Windows update services, the Office Team Blogs as listed below and/or via the links from the below table.
As usual, after you finish applying the updates, run the SharePoint 2010 Products Configuration Wizard. Or, at a command line, on every server in the farm, run: psconfig -cmd upgrade -inplace b2b -wait
Uninstall or Disable Office Web Apps? Use this guide to chose whether Office web apps might be required or should be uninstalled: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/opal/archive/2011/02/10/uninstall-or-disable-office-web-apps.aspx | https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/steve_chen/p/build2010presp2/ |
As previously discussed, Aussie born GorillaStack is one of the earliest vendors to address the complexities of Cloud cost management.
Since its inception, GorillaStack has evolved into a more expansive Cloud monitoring service, with a growing focus on security and compliance. In March 2021, GorillaStack announced real-time event monitoring for AWS. With this announcement, it expands the monitoring of events to Azure, and confirms IBRS analysis that Cloud cost optimisation and security compliance go hand-in-hand. In short, enforcing configurations for security follows the same processes and uses common architectures as enforcing financial governance within Cloud infrastructure. | https://ibrs.com.au/practices/cyber-risk/security-readiness/softwareone |
In today’s digital-based world, staying safe online is more important than ever. Viruses, keylogging programs, malicious software, data breaches, and other online threats can compromise your personal information and lead to financial problems, identity theft, unrecoverable loss of computer files and more devastating effects.
Unfortunately, these threats can never be perfectly avoided, since people who hack find ways around cyber security measures intended to thwart their efforts every single day. However, you can definitely take some steps to reduce the probability of your computer systems being compromised.
1. Don’t neglect the importance of strong passwords. Make sure to use a combination of letters, numbers, and symbols in your passwords in order to make them difficult to guess — complete words are the easiest for hackers to figure out. There are many sites online that will generate these types of random secure passwords for you. It is also recommended to never use the same password for two or more websites since it will make it much easier for a hacker to take over your accounts if the passwords across websites are homogenous.
2. Watch out for phishing attacks. Phishing is when someone attempts to obtain sensitive information (like your username, password, or credit card information), by pretending to be a trustworthy entity (such as a friend, family member, or even a company) in an email or text message. Many phishing attempts can look very realistic, which is why many people fall for them. For example, someone may create a fake website for a bank that looks like the official website and send you an email with a link to the site, where you are prompted to input your personal information. However, inputting your information in this site means you fell for the bait — and the attacker walks away with your personal information to use as they please.
The best way to prevent phishing is to always err on the side of caution when receiving an email from a bank or other official entity that requires input of sensitive information. If you have a feeling an email or text may be a phishing attempt, don’t click on any links in the message. Instead, contact the institution directly through an official phone number or an online system that you are 100% sure is legitimate to confirm with them.
3. Use two-factor authentication. Two-factor authentication is a method of confirming a user’s identity by sending a unique code to your phone or email to use before being able to login to a website. This reduces the chance of your account being breached, because someone trying to hack you would have to have access to both platforms to login successfully. While this does take extra time, we think it’s definitely worth it to keep your account safe.
4. Make sure you keep up to date with the latest security patches. Whenever your computer or phone’s operating system prompts you to update, make sure you do so as soon as possible. These updates often fix bugs in the system, and improve security against malicious software. When you use an outdated operating system, you are vulnerable to cyber attacks.
5. Backup your most important files. Even if you follow all of the tips we’ve mentioned, there is unfortunately still always a chance you can be a victim of a cyber attack. If this occurs, you want to have copies of any files that are important to you readily available. InStream offers services intended to ensure your files are backed up remotely and can be immediately restored if needed — contact us for more information. | https://instreamllc.com/2017/06/27/5-cyber-security-tips-you-can-implement-today/ |
A vulnerability in the UDP processing functionality of Cisco IOS XE Software for Embedded Wireless Controllers on Catalyst 9100 Series Access Points could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) condition.
This vulnerability is due to the improper processing of UDP datagrams. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending malicious UDP datagrams to an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to cause the device to reload, resulting in a DoS condition.
Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. There are no workarounds that address this vulnerability.
Sql injection dorks 2020. Get up for work dudes, find vulnerable site… – Hicran Temiz November 26, 2022 | https://intelligentsystemsmonitoring.com/knowledgebase/cisco/cisco-ios-xe-software-for-embedded-wireless-controllers-on-catalyst-9100-series-access-points-udp-processing-denial-of-service-vulnerability/ |
A data breach by North Lincolnshire Council could result in sensitive documents, like adoption records or tenancy agreements, being accessed, lost or stolen. This could cause undue stress leading to prolonged mental health issues. This might be why you want to claim compensation.
Our solicitors offer No Win No Fee agreements to those claimants who have valid cases, meaning that you won’t have to worry about paying legal fees during the claims process and if you lose you don’t have to pay anything either.
There is, however, an important aspect regarding claim timescales. Basically, to be able to claim, you need to begin the process:
Within six years
Or within one year if it involves a breach of human rights.
Compensation calculations can be difficult to estimate until more details are known about your case. Therefore, please contact one of our advisors for free legal advice. They could inform you if you’re eligible to claim and can offer a reliable compensation estimate. Call them 24/7 using the phone number at the top of this page.
Rates Of Data Security Leaks And Incidents
Many things can result in a North Lincolnshire Council data protection breach. An important aspect for any data controller relates to cybersecurity and the internal systems being used. With The Cyber Security Breaches Survey 2021, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport assessed the data protection provisions of UK organisations.
As you can see above, 20% of the businesses that took part in the survey overall had a version of Windows that was not up-to-date. 32% of large firms and 28% of companies within utilities and production didn’t have an up-to-date version.
This means that these organisations may be more susceptible to a data breach, resulting in sensitive information like social service or tenant documentation being at a greater risk.
These statistics show that your data may be more at risk than you previously thought. Therefore, if a breach did happen due to your local council not updating their systems effectively, you may be able to claim compensation.
What Is A Compensation Claim For A North Lincolnshire Council Data Breach?
A data breach is a breach of security that causes loss, accidental or unlawful destruction, alteration, unauthorised access or disclosure of personal data.
The obligations of a data controller like North Lincolnshire Council are to make sure they comply with data protection laws. Part of that is making sure your personal data is as safe and secure as it can reasonably be.
This is one of the main aspects of making a successful data breach claim. The third-party would need to have done something wrong, leading to either them causing the data breach themselves or not taking sufficient precautions to prevent it.
Therefore, for you to make a successful claim following a North Lincolnshire Council data breach, the council would need to be at least partially responsible. For instance, if a hacker could steal your personal data because their cybersecurity was not updated, you could potentially receive compensation if you suffered damage to your finances or mental health as a result.
Precautions that could prevent such a data breach include the third party hiring a data protection officer, who monitors internal compliance to make sure they are following data protection laws. Firms could also hire specialists to conduct mock hacks (or penetration testing) of their security systems to reveal any vulnerabilities.
To know more about pursuing a case and claiming compensation, you can visit the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) website or contact us today.
Do Councils Have To Comply With GDPR?
This section will answer such queries as “What is GDPR?” and give you a better understanding of the basis of making a claim.
In 2018, European-wide legislation was introduced to establish regulations to protect people’s personal data. In making sure that businesses were compliant with this, the UK passed the Data Protection Act 2018. Complementing these pieces of legislation are The Data Protection, Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2020, and the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (PECR).
GDPR, or the General Data Protection Regulation, is the practical implication of these data protection laws. Basically, businesses can only hold personal data for specific purposes, and they need to ensure that sufficient protection is in place to avoid a preventable data breach.
As previously mentioned, if the third party, like North Lincolnshire Council, was unable to prevent the data breach, meaning it happened even when they were complying with all the required laws, it’s unlikely you’d be able to claim. For example, some organisations can be targeted by malicious hackers. If they’ve done all they can to protect themselves, a claim would be unlikely to succeed.
The data breach may not be caused by the council. If, for example, a data breach has been caused by financial institutions such as Capital One or Halifax, you may be able to claim if they were breaching personal data law.
Sending tenant documents, such as the agreement, to the previous address when the new address has been provided.
Their data protection officer is not sufficiently checking the company’s cybersecurity and thereby failing to update it. This could result in a cyberattack causing all of your personal information to be stolen.
An ex-employee accessing their systems to gather information for their own personal use. If there are no safeguarding checks in place, this could justify a claim.
Sending social services documentation, such as adoption records, to the wrong email address. Sometimes these breaches can expose the data of vulnerable people, creating significant distress.
Revealing identifiable information, such as name and address, due to the council providing a list of people objecting to planning applications. Such information should be redacted.
Emailing scans of tenancy audit documents to the wrong address.
Providing personal information about you over the phone to another person without passing the relevant GDPR checks.
Including passport data in an information pack for the wrong property. This could leave you vulnerable to identity theft.
Social services documents, regarding either older people you help look after or a child you’ve adopted, could also be ascertained through a data breach.
However, particular organisations can perform investigatory requests for information and disclosure of these records does not require your consent provided there is a lawful basis for sharing. These include:
This is largely for purposes such as preventing or detecting criminal activity, keeping tax records up to date, and for any emergency medical or wellbeing reasons.
With this in mind, you may be wondering, “What personal information could be taken if I was the victim of a North Lincolnshire Council data breach?” You can send a subject access request to a company to review your personal information on their system. This can give you a greater awareness of what information companies hold for you, so you understand the potential risks if a data breach was to take place.
It isn’t just North Lincolnshire Council data protection security that could be breached. Therefore, click here if you’re looking to make a data breach claim against other companies, such as Quickquid or TSB Bank. If you’d prefer to speak to one of our advisors for free legal advice about a potential claim, call us 24/7 using the details at the top of this page.
Notifying ICO Of The Breach
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) helps monitor and regulate data protection laws to ensure organisations adhere to them. As such, you can raise a complaint with them if you feel your personal data has been stolen or mishandled in contravention of the UK GDPR. However, the ICO does recommend that you:
In the first instance, get in contact with the third party responsible for the data breach. So, if you feel like the data breach occurred due to North Lincolnshire Council’s data collection policies, you would initially contact them. The best way of doing this may be through their data protection officer.
Secondly, you should only contact the ICO if you receive no adequate response within 3 months.
However, please bear in mind that you don’t need to contact the ICO and you’re free to speak to solicitors at any time.
The ICO doesn’t normally investigate cases where there’s been an undue delay in contacting them.
It’s always best to direct your correspondence to their data protection officer if they have one.
Don’t forget: if they refuse to accept responsibility or you feel like their response is inadequate, you can contact us for legal advice 24/7 at a time that works for you.
You can take a similar approach if you want to complain about data breaches from companies such as Virgin Mobile or BT.
What Financial Losses And Distress Could Your Claim Include?
GDPR provides you with rights, like the ability to submit a subject access request to ascertain the personal data that companies have. It also gives you other rights, such as claiming compensation if you have suffered due to the third party breaking data protection law. In this instance, there are two possible heads of claim:
Material Damage – These relate to the financial losses you either have or could suffer due to the breach. After all, compromised data can be a permanent issue. You could become the victim of identity fraud which can greatly impact the quality of your life.
Non-Material Damage – These relate to the psychological damage caused by the event. As such, you could claim compensation for things like emotional distress, loss of privacy and anxiety.
The amount of compensation you receive would depend on the extent of the data breach and to what degree the event has affected you. You could also have been affected by a data breach from an educational institution, such as a university or a college. If you can show they’ve neglected their responsibilities as a data controller, our solicitors could lead to you receiving thousands of pounds in compensation.
You also don’t need to worry about needing to suffer both kinds of damage to make a claim. This is because it’s possible to claim for just the psychological damage caused by the data breach. Previously, you needed to have suffered some form of financial loss to claim successfully. This changed due to the ruling in the case Vidal-Hall and others v Google Inc [2015]. The Court of Appeal confirmed that non-material damage, like anxiety and PTSD, could be claimed without suffering any material losses due to the stress involved with such an event.
Another case, Gulati and others v MGN Ltd [2015], clarified how psychological issues can be quantified. The court stated that personal injury compensation awards ought to be considered.
As such, information from the Judicial College is used. The Judicial College built these compensation brackets by reviewing previous payouts and analysing them against the nature and extent of the injury.
With that in mind, below is a list of mental health issues that could be caused by a data breach. This should give you a better understanding of the amount of compensation you could receive.
Mental Anguish £4,380 The incident in question has caused mental health issues resulting in fear of impending death which can be caused by a genuine reduction in life expectancy.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder £56,180 to £94,470 Cases in this bracket result in prolonged and permanent effects that prevent the injured person from functioning anywhere near their pre-trauma level. Every aspect of their life is significantly affected including their ability to work and communicate.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder £21,730 to £56,180 Injuries in this bracket have a better outlook and prognosis than the bracket above. The amount received in this bracket depends on their response to professional care. However, a large degree of disability will still be experienced in the immediate future.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder £7,680 to £21,730 In this instance, the injured person will have made a significant step to recovery and any continuous symptoms still being experienced will not be particularly disabling.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Up to £7,680 Minor symptoms of PTSD that resolve in full within a short space of time.
General Psychiatric Damage £51,460 to £108,620 The injured person will have significant problems, greatly affecting their ability to handle everyday life. As such, the prognosis will be very poor.
General Psychiatric Damage £17,900 to £51,460 There will still be life-altering issues that affect the injured person's ability to handle aspects of life, work and education. However, the prognosis will be better than the above bracket.
General Psychiatric Damage £5,500 to £17,900 There will be a substantial improvement to the bracket above in being able to cope with the outside world and, as such, the prognosis will be more positive. People affected by work-related stress may fall within this bracket.
For a valuation more relevant to your circumstances, please get in touch on the number on the top of this page.
North Lincolnshire Council Data Breach – No Win No Fee Claims
We’re proud to offer our services on a No Win No Fee basis. What does this mean?
Nothing to pay upfront or as the claim progresses.
You won’t have to pay legal fees to them if your claim didn’t result in compensation.
If the claim is a success, your solicitor will deduct a small percentage of your compensation award to cover their fees.
Our solicitors are very experienced in handling all types of claims. Therefore, it isn’t just Scunthorpe Council data breach claims that they will be able to help you with. If you’ve been the victim of a data breach due to Money Supermarket or Compare the Market, you can contact our advisors to see if you can claim.
Choosing A Lawyer For Your Data Leak Case
Remember that you don’t need to look locally for a lawyer. Online reviews can help narrow down your search. The important thing is to find legal representation that’s right for you and appropriate for your needs.
With that in mind, our lawyers are very experienced and have a great track record. Just check out our reviews for proof. Working with us could result in you receiving thousands of pounds in compensation.
For more information about how the UK General Data Protection Regulation works, visit the ICO website.
To read more data breach guidance for individuals and families, visit the National Cyber Security Centre.
Visit the Government website to know more about making a data protection complaint.
Have you experienced a data breach from Public Health Wales? If so, visit our website to see if you can claim.
You could potentially claim for an NHS data breach. To see if you can, click here.
Suffered from a Crown prosecution data breach? If so, and you want to see if you can receive compensation, click here. | https://www.legalexpert.co.uk/data-breach-compensation/north-lincolnshire-council-data-breach/ |
If you continue to have problems with removal of the winzip driver updater potentially unwanted application, reset your Google Chrome browser settings. Wikipedia’s original medium was for users to read and edit content using any standard web browser through a fixed Internet connection.
If you are searching for an easy-to-use and powerful tool to scan and repair disk errors, then Check Disk might be the best pick for you.
Thus, using which one of them depends on your situation.
Florida is suing the makers of certain firefighting foams, accusing them of polluting the environment and potentially sickening people with chemicals.
So, now that you are well aware of the needs and purpose of a driver updater tool, let’s explore Bit Driver Updater in detail.
The Device Manager window will open, showing you a list of all the hardware attached to your computer. https://rocketdrivers.com/manufacturers/brother/printers/brother-mfc-490cw-printer Third-party tools or vendors that provide driver updates. Most of these companies have a driver download section where you can find drivers to match your computer parts, operating system, and software. For some users, installing drivers might happen so quickly that you don’t even pay attention to it. For more high-performance computing users, drivers are an essential element that can keep the entire computer system functioning smoothly and as fast as possible. This package contains the files needed for installing the Touchpad driver.
It will only collect the latest versions of the device drivers from the official manufacturer’s website to ensure the users with safety. It also creates a restore point before each update in case you need to revert it.
Microsoft took the functionality of the traditional touchpad and took it a step forward with the Precision Touchpad. It’s a program developed by Microsoft in form of a driver that improved the standard gestures of the touchpad. Since the precision touchpad is not something that every laptop has it can be frustrating if your laptop doesn’t have it, which means that you will not be able to utilize it. Over the past decade laptops began to play a very important role in our daily lives. Regardless if we are using them for business or entertainment, they offer something that desktop PCs don’t – mobility. Being a mobile PC means that apart from the keyboard it has a device for controlling the pointer – the touchpad. If you already have the latest firmware, you can still press the “Firmware version” button and “update” again. | https://www.naranjanmetals.com/2022/04/26/is-winzip-driver-updater-malware-spyware-really/ |
This one isn’t necessarily support related but if any of you are in the Seattle area here’s a really cool opportunity for you. Microsoft User Research is in need of Seattle area IT Professionals of larger organizations of at least 500 PC’s and 16 servers for a research study. This study will run Thursday, July 22 through Tuesday, July 27, and will be two hours long on the Microsoft campus in Redmond. For those who participate, we can offer you a choice of Microsoft technical hardware or software in appreciation for your time.
If interested, please respond to [email protected] with the subject of “SMS/SCCM” and the following information: | https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/configurationmgr/2010/07/15/microsoft-user-research-needs-it-professionals-with-sms-2003-or-configmgr-2007-experience/ |
Hybrid cloud is the de facto means of operation for many complex enterprise organizations. It is usually an IT environment that combines the elements of public cloud, private cloud and on-premise infrastructure. The best feature of a hybrid cloud is it offers flexibility to move workloads into varied environments while leveraging the maximum benefits from those environments.
There are many strong reasons why you must use a hybrid cloud. However, hybrid cloud security also comes with a few challenges, which is a prime concern for many. Let’s start with its use cases first and then we’ll move on to discuss its challenges and best practices.
Most organizations start their cloud journey using their on-premises infrastructure. They do it by installing Kubernetes and virtual machines in data centers and then converting their monolith applications into microservices. Finally, they deploy it to the on-premises systems.
However, with the help of a hybrid cloud, you can simply move a couple of workloads to the public cloud systems. In that case, you don’t have to go through the tedious process of managing and scaling the on-premise instances. In short, you get to use the hybrid cloud while benefiting from the scalability of a public cloud service provider.
Lets You Use Various Cloud Vendors
Each cloud provider has got its specialty in either service, support levels, SLAs, or pricing. Therefore, by using multiple vendors, you get to enjoy the benefits from more than one cloud provider.
However, using multiple cloud providers isn’t easy as each has its own APIs and management portals, and managing them from a single place would be difficult.
That’s when the hybrid cloud comes to your rescue. Its flexible and mix-match model makes it possible to enjoy the benefits of multiple cloud vendors without having to worry about management.
Following are the different hybrid cloud security challenges.
In a hybrid cloud, the data passes to and from public and private clouds which may result in vulnerabilities leading to cyberattacks.
Since hybrid clouds are complex, it is more difficult to effectively create and maintain compliance protocols.
When you’re using a hybrid cloud, it means that your public cloud service provider is solely responsible for your data governance and accountability. In that case, any compromise in security can lead to critical data loss.
DDoS or Distributed Denial of Service is another hybrid cloud challenge that comes from multiple sources and targets a single location. As these attacks have multiple sources, it is difficult to trace or detect them, thereby posing a high-risk factor.
Hybrid Cloud Security Best Practices
Since hybrid cloud security is challenging due to its distributed nature and multiple components, the ideal way to start using it is by using the best practices according to the industry standards.
Plan carefully when it comes to managing the credentials, passwords, keys, or certificates.
Thoroughly review the network topology with the aid of network and security experts.
Scan the container images to see if there is any vulnerability. Finally, ensure to deploy only the secured ones.
Put a zero-trust approach into practice when it comes to new tools, applications, or environments.
Go for continuous audits to ensure compliance checks and real-time visibility.
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viewed_cookie_policy 11 months The the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data. | https://cloud-tech-alert.com/blogs/hybrid-cloud-security-use-cases-challenges-best-practices/ |
Do you know what Search.searchdconvertnow.com is?
If Search.searchdconvertnow.com is opened to you when you launch any of your browsers, it must be true that a browser extension Download Converter Now has been installed on the computer. It could have entered your system together with free programs or you downloaded and installed it willingly from its official website downloadconverternow.com. No matter what is the story behind the entrance of this browser extension, it would be best to go to delete it if it has already been set on all web browsers. Specialists suggest doing so not only to help users to get rid of the dubious search tool. It is said so because it has been found that security-related problems might arise if a user decides to keep Search.searchdconvertnow.com set on browsers. This search tool will always be set on your browsers and you will have to use it as a default search tool if you do not do anything to eliminate it. What you can do to get rid of it is to delete the extension from browsers. This is the only way to do that no matter you have willingly downloaded and installed it from its official website or it has somehow entered the computer without your consent.
When the Download Converter Now extension is installed on the computer, it immediately changes all browsers’ settings. More specifically, you will find it set on your browsers as homepage, default search engine, and the New Tab page. The appearance of a search tool is not everything. In some cases, a search tool is far from being trustworthy but looks decent. The same can be told about Search.searchdconvertnow.com. It has a search box that returns search results, and it enables users to access such websites as cloudconvert.com/pdf-to-doc, dictionary.com, and cloudconvert.com/doc-to-pdf with the click of a button. Users find these features of Search.searchdconvertnow.com quite beneficial, but, in the opinion of our researchers who have tested this search tool in their lab, users make a mistake by trusting this search engine. The main problem is associated with the search results it shows. Recent research has revealed that the search results page shown by Search.searchdconvertnow.com might contain advertisements. In most cases, they take the form of reputable search results, so it might be impossible to recognize and thus ignore them. These ads are put on the search results page so that many users would click on them and end up on third-party websites they promote. In other words, they are shown to users just to drive the traffic to certain web pages. Unfortunately, there is a risk of landing on a bad website containing malicious software as well. Therefore, specialists say that it would be best to stop using such a search engine. Search.searchdconvertnow.com screenshot
Scroll down for full removal instructions
Even though Search.searchdconvertnow.com looks like a beneficial search provider, our team of security specialists suggests removing it from the system as soon as possible also because they have found that it might record personal information. It gathers these details only if a user enters them into the search box of Search.searchdconvertnow.com; however, this still shows that this search provider cannot be fully trusted. Therefore, users should go to get rid of it as soon as possible. Since there are so many other similar search tools that might appear on browsers, e.g. search.yourpackagesnow.com, search.yourrmapscenter.com, and search.youremailnow.com, you might find a new search tool set without your consent on all your browsers again if you are not careful. In most cases, they travel bundled with freeware, so be extremely careful when installing new software downloaded from the web.
All you need to do to remove Search.searchdconvertnow.com from browsers is to delete the Download Converter Now extension. Internet Explorer users can delete it through Control Panel; however, if you are a user of Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome, you will have to remove the undesirable extension from these browsers separately. Instructions are provided below this article to help you; however, the manual method is not the only one you can employ. Just like any other program, the extension promoting Search.searchdconvertnow.com can be erased automatically too. This is the quickest undesirable software removal method. | http://www.spyware-techie.com/search-searchdconvertnow-com-removal-guide |
2018 saw some of the advanced cyber attacks in history. From Facebook to Marriot to Panera Bread, many companies fell victim to hackers, and the records stolen numbered in the billions.
2019 is promising to be even riskier for companies that do not properly bolster their data security. Use this article to familiarize yourself with potential threats to guard against this year.
Supply chain infiltration
Businesses protecting themselves with the most advanced security measures are still vulnerable and will find themselves being attacked from unlikely sources: their friends. By infiltrating a third party, hackers may turn one of your most trusted suppliers into a Trojan horse that lets malware through your front door.
2018 saw alarming threats of cyber espionage on some of the biggest U.S. companies, and a massive breach at Target a few years earlier was linked back to one of its key suppliers.
Social media hacking grows
Among Facebook’s 2.27 billion accounts and Twitter’s 320 million, it is estimated that at least 2% of Facebook accounts and 5% of Twitter accounts are fake.
Although hackers may trouble your business accounts, they are more likely to infiltrate your company through employee profiles. Through messages, authentication hacks, and other tricks, hackers can gain access to passwords and code that give them a skeleton key, or unauthorized access, to your company. Moreover, most employees will be too afraid to admit their mistake, allowing the wound to fester.
AI video and audio fakes
As AI, or artificial intelligence, and graphics tech becomes more advanced, hackers are able to create audio and video of real people using just a computer. Known as “deepfakes,” these incredibly realistic media snippets can mimic your brand, your spokesperson, or even your company leadership.
Imagine a hacker creating an audio clip of your CFO admitting that your company is under investigation for fraud. This may be completely untrue, but by the time the mess is cleaned up, you may have already lost half of your clients.
These attacks will grow frequent in 2019, because data is more valuable than ever. Only companies keeping a constant eye on security will catch and contain deepfakes in time.
Blockchain’s growing pains
Blockchain tech is seen as one of the most secure ways to transact, but it is also in its youthful stages and therefore ripe for opportunistic hackers.
Blockchain contracts are being pushed as easy, worry-free ways to provide payment for services. These contracts are designed to automatically release payment once programmed conditions are met. As of now, if a blockchain contract is created properly, no problems should arise. However, since these contracts are so new, many of them have bugs and flaws, allowing hackers to trigger payments and escape with millions in completely untraceable cryptocurrency. In other words, they are a hacker’s dream come true.
The rise of cloudhoppers
As we can see with blockchain, new technology lures hackers like flies to honey. Blockchain may not be pervasive in the system yet, but another relatively new advancement is: the cloud.
Although cloud storage is a safer option for security than locally housing your data, IT companies that manage cloud services make enticing targets for hackers. As hacking becomes more advanced in 2019, unprepared data security companies will fall victim to hacking, and the results will be catastrophic.
If a hacker invades just one IT firm’s cloud services, then the hacker can gain access to every client’s data. In short, do not abandon the cloud. It can help you stay competitive. Just remember to choose your managed IT services firm wisely.
Small businesses become popular targets
Big corporations will still fall victim to hackers in 2019. Company leadership (which has previously lacked a proper understanding of IT and cybersecurity) is starting to spend the necessary money and give security priority.
As a result, more hackers will work their way down the ladder to smaller businesses that have not upgraded their security. Before, these businesses were not worth a hacker’s attention. In 2019, however, they will be seen as easier targets, and you do not want to be one of them.
For more information
As your data becomes more valuable than ever before, it’s crucial to understand the benefits of managed IT services to protect your company and your customers. Just one breach could prove ruinous to everything you’ve worked so hard to build. In fact, 17% of companies hacked last year paid over $100,000 to deal with the aftermath.
Scale Technology is an Arkansas managed IT service provider that takes your security seriously. Our team is dedicated to building custom security solutions that fit your precise needs as well as educating your team on how to prevent breaches from within.
Do not be an easy target for hackers. Take action that secures your company and the information you have worked so hard to protect.
Our team will build custom security solutions that fit your needs, and educate your team on how to prevent breaches from within. For more information, contact Scale Technology today at (501) 213-3298. | https://www.letscale.com/the-biggest-cyber-threats-of-2019__trashed-2/ |
This web site at xxxxxxxx.com has been reported as a web forgery and has been blocked based on your security preferences.
Web forgeries are designed to trick you into revealing personal or financial information by imitating sources you may trust.
Entering any information on this web page may result in identity theft or other fraud.
Click to expand...
So im like WTF again lol... i searched google for my site and google says the same thing as firefox. this site doesnt even collect data from anyone its purley an info site no user registration or anything. Never used for blackhat just a my own hobby site, anyone have any ideas on why this would happen? I'm really confused right now never had this happen.
edit: ive searched through google cant figure out why this happened or how i can fix it i used this form: http://www.google.com/safebrowsing/report_error/?tpl=mozilla but i dont know if thats enough seems like it wouldnt be that easy... looks like ive just got to scrap this site? this totally sucks lol i was up to #3 on google for my keyword.
along with /java folder that I didn't put there. Once I removed that stuff and reuploaded the clean file, all was good. The host asked us to be sure we were running the most recent plugins, since possibly there were some holes in previous ones. We were running wordpress in /blog, but the above warning was in the root.
Certainly don't know if that is your problem, but do take a look.
By the looks of the url, you got hacked and someone put up a paypal phishing page on your host.
Try to re-up the files and close whatever hole they got in through.
Also, sometimes the server itself is compromised, not just your hosting account. In this case, a secure site won't change things at all.
did they include the access/ftp logs of the site as well... this maybe give you some insight to why your site was taken down and googles warning...
i will be more than happy to check for you if you want me too...
im guessing youve had some type of hacking or sql injection - was you using some kind of cms....
check your directory permissions make sure you have no chmod 777 folders... and check your are using the latest version of any scripts you are using, if its joomla the latest version is j1.5.10 | https://www.blackhatworld.com/seo/google-says-my-site-is-a-phishing-site.81510/ |
While apparel manufacturing receives a high-tech facelift, the possibility of cyber attacks remains rampant for industrial robots worldwide.
As Industry 4.0 becomes more of a reality, retailers worldwide are beginning to incorporate technology, including industrial robots, to ramp up their clothing production process. According to research by Trend Micro’s Forward-Looking Threat Research (FTR) team and university Politecnico di Milani (POLIMI), the current ecosystem of industrial robots remains at high risk for cyber attacks, due to lack of industry awareness and outdated software.
Both parties conducted a comprehensive security analysis, where they tested a working industrial robot for cyber attack responsiveness. The robot in the case study represented today’s class of industrial robots in terms of architecture qualities and standards. From the testing, FTR and POLIMI discovered that most industrial robots possessed outdated software, since they were reliant on vulnerable and cryptographic libraries and weak authentication systems. What’s more, both parties found that thousands of industrial devices were situated on public IP (Internet Protocol) addresses, enabling attackers to easily access and damage them. | https://sourcingjournal.com/topics/technology/retailers-need-know-industrial-robot-cyber-attacks-69063/ |
If you’ve been pondering whether to get AVG anti virus or another identical program for your computer, you aren’t alone. 2 weeks . popular choice with many people, and is a fantastic addition to the computer’s security suite. Nevertheless , free vpn firestick if you been uncertain of whether to get AVG, after that read on for a few helpful advice. The first step to buying AVG antivirus is usually to know just what it does. This program helps to defend your computer against viruses, malware, and other via the internet threats.
AVG has intensive online support. There is a extensive FAQ webpage, but it has the not one of the most useful. AVG also has a dedicated support webpage. There, you are able to access live chat with a technology support repetition, or data file a solution if you’re possessing technical issue. However , you should consider calling AVG technical support before purchasing its support desk. At this time there, you’ll be given a quick response on questions that usually are addressed in the FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS.
Another important characteristic in an anti-virus is real-time protection. Even a tiny delay can include disastrous outcomes. Thankfully, AVG’s real-time cover keeps suspicious files and programs right from being introduced and attached to your computer. This proper protection also means that you could scan anonymous files when they’re being used. In addition , it also allows administrators to manage AVG antivirus from a central position. You can slightly configure, install, and deploy AVG antivirus security software on as much computers because you want. You can also use the software’s automatic revisions. | https://naavyatech.com/2022/06/29/circumstance-buy-avg-antivirus/ |
HARRISBURG – Gov. Tom Wolf announced Monday the availability of $5 million in funding for security enhancement projects for non-profit organizations serving diverse communities throughout the commonwealth.
Administered by the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency (PCCD), the Non-profit Security Grant Fund Program issues grants to 501(c)(3) non-profit organizations that principally serve individuals, groups or institutions that are included within a bias motivation category for single bias hate crime incidents as identified by the FBI’s Hate Crime Statistics publication.
Applicants are eligible for security enhancements designed to protect the safety and security of the users of a facility located in the commonwealth that is owned or operated by the nonprofit organization.
“These grants expand the school safety and security grants introduced in 2019,” Wolf said. “And will continue to help our many non-profits address security needs and any safety concerns that exist for religious, social and other non-profit organizations across the commonwealth.”
Applicants can find the application and information about the Program on PCCD’s Web site at http://www.pccd.pa.gov. Grant awards can range from $5,000 to $150,000 for a wide variety of eligible items, including:
Vulnerability and threat assessments.
The application period will be open for a 30-day window to Wednesday, Feb. 3. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis by a PCCD-established workgroup comprised of representatives of PCCD, the Pennsylvania State Police and the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security, with awards being considered at the March 10 PCCD meeting.
Questions regarding the Program and the application process should be forwarded to: [email protected].
PCCD’s mission is to enhance the quality, coordination and planning within the criminal and juvenile justice systems, to facilitate the delivery of services to victims of crime, and to increase the safety of our communities. | https://gantnews.com/2021/01/05/gov-wolf-2021-non-profit-security-grant-fund-program-now-open/ |
Carlos Salas, Engineering Manager at NordLayer, is the next guest in the latest Dinis Guarda YouTube Podcast Series and hosted this time by financial expert and vice chairman of ztudium, citiesabc and openbusinescouncil Hilton Supra. Carlos and Hilton discuss the relevance of cybersecurity measures in the current technological scenario, the latest innovation in cybersecurity and the challenges in a Metaverse and Web 3.0 landscape.
A software architect and AWS cloud specialist, Carlos Salas is currently serving with his technological acumen at NordLayer. Carlos has more than 12 years of experience in fields such as Unix Administration, Software Development, Database Administration, Cloud Architecture, and Research and Development. As Carlos explained early in the interview, he was always innovating and experimenting since his childhood days and has had an inquisitive mind toward technology and its application. He received his Master’s Degree in Informatics from the University of Vilnius. After that first contact between the two experts, they talked about how NordLayer's cutting-edge products and solutions create an impenetrable layer of security that is affordable for and accessible to everyone across the globe. From there on, the conversation turned into a masterclass in cybersecurity in today’s digitized world.
The challenges of cybersecurity in the Web 3.0, NFTs and Metaverse era
NFTs, Metaverse, and Web 3.0 is the recent buzz in the town. Hilton was interested to know if the cybersecurity technologies that are a huge success today are equally (or even more) effective in Web 3.0. Carlos has the perfect answer for that: - "It's actually very peer-to-peer in essence. By using NordLayer, everyone is in the local area network. It doesn't matter where you are. For systems where there is no centralisation, you have a segment that is connected to the internet, to the main net, but at the same time, it is micro-segmented. So, there are only very specific people that are going to be accessing certain central resources, and not all of them."
He also explained how private gateways by NordLayer are responsible for maintaining a private line of communication between the peer group. Carlos patiently explained to Hilton how NordLayer maintains the level of security, while also maintaining the authenticity of digital avatars and an overall landscape of cybersecurity in the Metaverse. Drawing an interesting simile, Carlos explained the cybersecurity measures at NordLayer: - "We use military-grade encryption. You can't actually unencrypt this even by using a good force (unless by quantum computers). If you look at the research, it would take a few billion years to unencrypt these types of connections and put them into a perspective. The universe is younger than the time you will take to unencrypt this type of connection."
Carlos also told Hilton that to keep abreast with the latest technological advancements and provide cybersecurity to the expanding landscape of technology, NoedLayer is constantly educating its users and the general public through its blog posts and websites. Concluding the interview, Carlos assured Hilton that the world is going to witness a wider adoption of the latest technologies in the next few years.
"Actually, right now, anyone that has a relatively modern device can use augmented reality. So, it's going to be a matter of a couple of years, that people are going to start that more. I would say it is already mainstream. You could go to the streets, take out your phone, and scan a QR code, and you will see something pop out in real life. So, it's already here.",
while being at the backend for support and round-the-clock assistance. In the words of Carlos, "It's actually easier than it sounds, especially when you are using this type of technology where you are like plug n play install and everything will be working as a system." | https://www.openbusinesscouncil.org/engineering-manager-at-nordlayer-carlos-salas-on-cybersecurity-in-web-3-0-at-the-latest-episode-on-dinis-guarda-youtube-podcast-talks-about |
Manual or in-house public key infrastructure (PKI) management solutions simply can’t keep up with the explosive growth of the keys and certificates that protect machine identities. Plus, homegrown PKI solutions often lack the central visibility and consistent processes you need to effectively defend against machine identity threats.
With automated PKI management, Venafi orchestrates the entire certificate lifecycle—from provisioning and rotation to replacement. You can automatically validate that PKI certificates are properly installed and configured. And, in the event of a compromise, automation dramatically accelerates remediation, allowing you to replace certificates in seconds.
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Venafi Cloud for DevOps Service. If you have registered to access and use the Venafi Cloud for DevOps Service, Your right to use the Venafi Cloud for DevOps Service shall extend indefinitely and may be terminated by either You or Venafi at any time for any reason.
Restrictions on Use. The grant of rights stated in Sections 2.1 and 2.2, above, is subject to the following restrictions and limitations:
If You have registered to access and use the Venafi Cloud for DevOps Service, You must use SSL/TLS certificates issued to you at no charge through the Service for development and testing purposes only, and You are strictly prohibited from using such SSL/TLS certificates in a production environment or in any production capacity. If you are registered with a public Certification Authority (“CA”) supported by the Service and have valid credentials issued by such CA with which you can subscribe to such CA’s SSL/TLS certificates on a fee bearing basis for use in production environments, You may request such certificates through the applicable interface present in the Service by using such credentials. In such instance, the fee bearing certificate(s) will be issued to You by the CA and any access to or use of such certificates by You will be subject to the terms and conditions set out by the CA. No fees will be paid to or processed by Venafi in this case. The use of DigiCert issued certificates shall be subject to the Certificate Services Agreement published by DigiCert at https://www.digicert.com/docs/agreements/Certificate-Services-Agreement.pdf, which terms are hereby incorporated by reference.
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This Agreement is binding on You as well as Your employees, employers, contractors and agents, and on any permitted successors and assignees. Except if otherwise superseded in writing by a separately executed agreement, this Agreement is the entire agreement between You and Venafi with regard to the License granted hereunder, and You agree that Venafi will not have any liability for any statement or representation made by it, its agents or anyone else (whether innocently or negligently) upon which You relied in entering into this Agreement, unless such statement or representation was made fraudulently. This Agreement supersedes any other understandings or agreements, including, but not limited to, advertising, with respect to the Service. If any provision of this Agreement is deemed invalid or unenforceable by any country or government agency having jurisdiction, that particular provision will be deemed modified to the extent necessary to make the provision valid and enforceable and the remaining provisions will remain in full force and effect. Should such modification be impractical or denied, You and Venafi shall thereafter each have the right to terminate this Agreement on immediate notice.
Survival. The parties agree that the rights and obligations set forth in the above-referenced Section 1 (Definitions), 3 (Ownership), 4 (Disclaimer of Warranties), 5 (Limitation of Liability), 6 (Term and Termination), 7 (Compliance with Laws), 8 (Governing Law), and 9 (General) shall survive the termination of this Agreement for any reason and enforcement thereof shall not be subject to any conditions precedent.
Assignment. This Agreement shall be binding upon and inure to the benefit of the parties’ respective successors and permitted assigns. You shall not assign this Agreement or any of Your rights or obligations hereunder without the prior written consent of Venafi and any such attempted assignment shall be void. | https://www.venafi.com/solutions/encryption-and-authorization/pki-refresh-outdated |
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the National Security Agency (NSA) issued a joint advisory (PDF) yesterday regarding increased Conti ransomware activity and detailing observed tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). According to the advisory, Conti ransomware has been used in over 400 attacks on US and international businesses.
Deepwatch’s Threat Intel Team has been tracking this activity to provide information as soon as possible. Please review our recent Significant Cyber Event Customer Advisory regarding Microsoft Exchange exploitation and the following headlines from our weekly Cyber Intelligence Brief (CIB):
Remote monitoring and management software.
The “PrintNightmare” & “Zerologon” vulnerabilities. And have been known to have used “ProxyShell” in attacks as well.
Deepwatch encourages customers to reach out to their squad manager about our vulnerability management services.
While the techniques above are commonly utilized, other techniques have also been seen, and a defense-in-depth strategy coupled with best security practices is the strongest way to reduce risk.
Additionally, details from a previously released Conti “playbook” identify four IP addresses used in previous attacks as Cobalt Strike C2 servers (Please see Appendix A).
Implement network segmentation and filter traffic.
Scan for vulnerabilities and keep software updated.
Remove unnecessary applications and apply controls.
Implement endpoint and detection response tools.
Limit access to resources over the network, especially by restricting RDP.
Deepwatch assesses with high confidence that ransomware attacks (including Conti) will continue due to insufficient prioritization of security hygiene for organizations’ Internet-facing systems coupled with the influx of recent vulnerabilities that affect externally facing systems.
Additionally, a recent discovery that REvil ransomware operators have been taking over ransom negotiations without their affiliate’s knowledge and pocketing the entire ransom payment themselves will likely cause potential affiliates to seek out other RaaS operators like Conti to facilitate their attacks. | https://www.deepwatch.com/labs/customer-advisory-for-awareness-increased-conti-ransomware-attacks/ |
The access control list provides an additional permission method for file systems, allowing you to grant permissions for any user or group to any disk resource.
Note: For these exercises, we will use the users and groups created in this previous post. | https://databook.one/2019/05/21/create-and-manage-access-control-lists-acls/ |
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III.Divya, S. V., Shaji, R. S., &Venkadesh, P. (2018). An Efficient Data Storage and Forwarding Mechanism Using Fragmentation-Replication and DADR Protocol for Enhancing the Security in Cloud. Journal of Computational and Theoretical Nanoscience,15(1), 111-120.
IV.Goyal, V., Pandey, O., Sahai, A., & Waters, B. (2006, October). Attribute-based encryptionfor fine-grained access control of encrypted data. InProceedings of the 13th ACM conference on Computer and communications security(pp. 89-98). Acm.
V.Hur, J. (2013). Improving security and efficiency in attribute-based data sharing. IEEE transactions on knowledge and data engineering,25(10), 2271-2282.
IX.Ning, J., Cao, Z., Dong, X., Liang, K., Wei, L., & Choo, K. R. (2018). CryptCloud+: Secure and Expressive Data Access Control for Cloud Storage. IEEE Transactions on Services Computing.
X.Patil, P., Narayankar, P., Narayan, D. G., &Meena, S. M. (2016). A comprehensive evaluation of cryptographic algorithms: DES, 3DES, AES, RSA, andBlowfish. Procedia Computer Science,78, 617-624.
XI.Qiu, M., Gai, K., Thuraisingham, B., Tao, L., &Zhao, H. (2018). Proactive user-centric secure data scheme using attribute-based semantic access controls for mobile clouds in financialindustry. Future Generation Computer Systems,80, 421-429.
XII.Sahai, A., & Waters, B. (2005, May). Fuzzy identity-based encryption. InAnnual International Conference on the Theory and Applications of Cryptographic Techniques(pp. 457-473). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
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XIV.Sookhak, M., Akhunzada, A., Gani, A., Khurram Khan, M., &Anuar, N. B. (2014). Towards dynamic remote data auditing in computational clouds. The Scientific World Journal,2014.
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XVI.Sookhak, M., Gani, A., Talebian, H., Akhunzada, A., Khan, S. U., Buyya, R., &Zomaya, A. Y. (2015). Remote data auditing in cloud computing environments: a survey, taxonomy, and open issues. ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR),47(4), 65.
XVII.Sookhak, M., Talebian, H., Ahmed, E., Gani, A., & Khan, M. K. (2014). A review on remote data auditing in single cloud server: Journal of Network and Computer Applications,43, 121-141.
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XXIII.Yuan, D., Song, X., Xu, Q., Zhao, M., Wei, X., Wang, H., & Jiang, H. (2018). An ORAM-based privacy-preservingdata sharing scheme for cloud storage. Journal of information security and applications,39, 1-9.
XXIV.Zhou, Z., & Huang, D. (2012, October). Efficient and secure data storage operations for mobile cloud computing. InProceedings of the 8th International Conference on Network and Service Management(pp. 37-45) . International Federation for Information Processing. | https://www.journalimcms.org/journal/an-enhanced-data-access-control-and-privacy-preserving-mechanism-in-cloud-using-uncrackable-cipher-dynamic-double-encryption-standard/ |
SAO PAULO : Brazilian asset manager Patria Investments Ltd has acquired cybersecurity companies Neosecure and Proteus to create the largest information security platform in Latin America, it said on Tuesday.
Patria, backed by Blackstone Group Inc, also said it plans to list shares in the new venture in the near future.
The firm did not disclose how much it has paid for the companies, but said that it will invest US$250 million in the sector.
It also aims to accelerate its growth in the information security market via new acquisitions.
The company added that its new cybersecurity venture operates in Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Peru and Colombia, with an annual revenue estimated at 500 million reais (US$91.66 million).
"Our goal is to accelerate the market consolidation through the acquisition of strategic players, and soon raise more capital via an initial public offering," said Marcelo Romcy, cofounder of Proteus and partner in the new platform.
Patria raised US$588 million in its own IPO on the Nasdaq earlier this year.
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You may also use a pair of sunglasses you currently own to determine your best size. Frame sizing is typically noted on the inside of either temple (see illustration below). Note: If the eye size is not indicated on the temple, look under the bridge.
WOMEN / DRESSES
Find the perfect sunglasses size for your face with our easy-to-use sunglasses sizing guide. Looking in a mirror, hold a ruler horizontally across your face. Measure in inches the distance between your left and right temples.
Then use the chart below to convert your measurement to a frame size that may suit your face.
The eye/lens size is usually first, then the bridge size, then temple size. Use the eye/lens size to determine the best frame size.
The eye size is typically going to be the most important size for identifying how a pair of sunglasses will look. The eye size number measures the width of the lens, measured from the bridge, in millimeters. The bridge width is the distance between the lenses in millimeters. And the third number is the length of the temple in millimeters. | https://visiongallery.in/greatest-free-antivirus-alternative/ |
In a new commentary published in Mealey's Data Privacy Law Report, partner Scott Seaman—co-chair of the firm's global Insurance Services Practice Group—and associate Sarah Anderson look back at some of the key decisions, trends, and developments impacting the U.S. insurance industry over the past couple of years. They also look ahead to what the new year promises.
The authors describe how while COVID-19 continues to rage in 2021, ESG/sustainability has taken the spotlight for insurers and reinsurers. They also review developments involving social inflation, COVID-19 business interruption, cyber/privacy, civil unrest, opioids, lead, construction defect, and securities law, among other challenges. | https://www.hinshawlaw.com/newsroom-news-mealeys-data-privacy-key-us-insurance-trends-developments.html |
It’s 10 p.m. Are you aware the place your shopper knowledge is?
That is the kind of query that retains many cybersecurity professionals up at evening — and for good purpose. Damages from cybercrimes are projected to price over 6 trillion {dollars} in 2021. Because the web continues to evolve, so do the methods shopper and enterprise knowledge may be manipulated. For tech companies working in large knowledge, it’s as much as cybersecurity professionals to remain forward of cybersecurity developments with a purpose to stop assaults.
We spoke to professionals from 5 completely different firms to seek out concerning the newest cybersecurity developments they’re watching, and the way these developments may influence their companies shifting ahead.
The erosion of person belief because of breach fatigue is changing into an growing drawback in gaining shopper buy-in for safety measures. Moreover, there is a rise in defender countermeasures because of new laws requiring accountability and reporting for firms. Defenders must find out about assaults and knowledge exfiltration as quickly as potential, as they’re monetarily on the hook for them in increasingly jurisdictions. Lastly, there will probably be an elevated sophistication of attacker capabilities as easy assault surfaces are regularly hardened by safety groups engaged on main merchandise like Google’s Chrome and Apple’s iOS. We’ll see industrial hacking instruments with AI and machine studying built-in to allow them to shortly function on harder targets en masse.
“Engineers discovering methods to function successfully whereas lowering the non-public knowledge they retailer could be the subsequent large factor.”
Microsegmentation, zero belief, and the safety expertise disaster are our major concerns within the cybersecurity trade. These three are a number of the key options which can be a part of our safety answer.
Microsegmentation and isolation create a brand new safe community perimeter — a logical air hole — at a time when the community perimeter appears to be disappearing within the trade. Zero belief is the method of “default deny all” in your community and trusting solely the units which can be essential to your enterprise. The safety expertise disaster remains to be rising and has gone from 70 % to 91 % in simply a number of months, partly because of abilities gaps and stress ranges. To assist with the expertise disaster, we offer an answer that’s simple to be taught and handle, and that doesn’t require years of discovered ability to manage.
“Whether or not you’re defending knowledge in infrastructure expertise or knowledge and lives in operational expertise, all of us may be hacked.”
Seven key parts of efficient safe networking: id, safety, confidentiality, visibility, resiliency, scalability and administration. Moreover, the logical air hole and ease. These could also be thought-about under-the-radar at the moment, however they’re lining as much as grow to be forefront developments for cybersecurity.
Securing at the moment’s networks and their objects remains to be a fancy course of. Together with the normal connect-then-secure course of, the safety expertise disaster, the problem of zero belief and the necessity for an inherently safe community perimeter, it’s essential for any firm to seek out the very best options that resolve these cybersecurity wants and points.
With the growing recognition of Docker and Kubernetes, one other rising pattern within the trade is the rising relevance of container breakout vulnerabilities. A standard misunderstanding is that containers (like OS virtualization) have full logical isolation after they truly share kernel house. Because of this misconfigurations or container breakout vulnerabilities in a single container can result in compromises throughout containers. We preserve a really shut eye on this specific class of vulnerabilities.
“The trade has additionally seen attackers grow to be extra artistic of their distributed denial-of-service assaults, which have the potential to take down servers and make assets unavailable to customers.“
I’ll begin with knowledge privateness. The GDPR and CCPA laws are main the way in which in giving customers extra management over their knowledge collected by companies. Knowledge assortment by companies has typically been in depth to drive inner knowledge evaluation to assist enterprise objectives and has just lately are available in direct battle with the laws and a shopper’s proper to privateness.
Then there’s large knowledge analytics. It is no shock that companies generate a number of knowledge. Successfully analyzing this knowledge, not solely from a enterprise perspective but in addition particularly for cybersecurity, is changing into essential for firms.
The third cybersecurity pattern is Shadow IT. Along with cloud infrastructure, firms and people are more and more leveraging SaaS functions to carry out quite a lot of work. All issues of inner, confidential and delicate firm knowledge are ending up in these functions. The issue is that IT and compliance groups are struggling to maintain up with the sheer variety of functions, the information saved inside them, and who within the group is utilizing them.
“Cell app fraud is one other large pattern. In response to RSA, greater than 60 % of fraud originates from cellular units.“
What under-the-radar cybersecurity developments are you watching that the trade is not speaking about?
AI assaults are a significant cybersecurity pattern that isn’t getting sufficient consideration. Hackers are more and more leveraging machine studying and synthetic intelligence methods to launch assaults. These applied sciences permit attackers to higher scale their operations and keep away from detection.
One other pattern is cloud misconfigurations. As extra firms transition to or start their journey within the cloud, misconfigurations have gotten a standard prevalence. Cloud SDKs and APIs permit for straightforward modifications by builders; nonetheless, this results in potential service disruptions or open the infrastructure to assault.
Cybercriminals are shifting towards cellular units as cellular banking and monetary apps enhance in recognition with customers.
Fileless malware, the rise of side-channel assaults like Rowhammer, and provide chain assaults are all cybersecurity developments we’re monitoring.
We’ve moved towards a zero-trust mannequin that assumes that intruders have already breached any community perimeter. Constructing methods with true defense-in-depth just isn’t non-compulsory in our house.
DISCLAIMER: BuiltinNYC is a paid accomplice of Stash. Funding advisory companies provided by Stash Investments LLC, an SEC registered funding advisor. This info is for academic function solely, and isn’t supposed as funding, authorized, accounting or tax recommendation.
Responses have been edited for size and readability. Photographs by way of listed firms. | https://fintechzoom.com/fintech_news_mobile-banking/21-cybersecurity-trends-to-watch-2020/ |
Risk management involves the evaluation of financial risks as well as the procedures that must be taken to minimize the risks that a company might take in such situations. Risk management graduate programs will boost your expertise to the next level.
If you want to become a pivotal player in either your current job or with a future employer, you might want to consider the field of risk management, a profession that is crucial to the success of all organizations, specially those that are making big investments and implementing major changes.
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Disclosure: EducationDynamics receives compensation for many of the featured schools on our websites (see “Sponsored School(s)” or “Sponsored Listings” or “Sponsored Results” or “Featured Graduate School(s)”. So what does this mean for you? Compensation may impact where the Sponsored Schools appear on our websites, including whether they appear as a match through our education matching services tool, the order in which they appear in a listing, and/or their ranking. Our websites do not provide, nor are they intended to provide, a comprehensive list of all schools (a) in the United States (b) located in a specific geographic area or (c) that offer a particular program of study. By providing information or agreeing to be contacted by a Sponsored School, you are in no way obligated to apply to or enroll with the school.
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EducationDynamics receives compensation for the featured schools on our website (see "Sponsored Schools" or "Sponsored Listings" or "Sponsored Results" or "Featured Schools'). Your trust is our priority. We at EducationDynamics believe you should make decisions about your education with confidence. That's why EducationDynamics is also proud to offer free information on its websites, which has been used by millions of prospective students to explore their education goals and interests. | https://www.gradschools.com/programs/organizational-leadership/risk-management?near=jacksonville |
Recently, Triconex Industries was put at risk when hackers attempted to hack into its security systems, trying to control things. These attacks have a pattern. They are made on gas and oil industries.
When traced, several hack attempts were made in various industries but the first attack was reported in the Middle East, experts are believing it to be Saudi Arabia.
However, it took it a little while for the attack to come out in the open as the hackers are said to be in stealth mode.
How Were The Saudi Plants Hacked?
According to Galina Antova, co-founder of Claroty, a cybersecurity firm, the hackers used a malware called Triton that indicated that the systems were operating fine when in reality they weren’t.
Triton can reprogram the controls of equipment which are made by Schneider Electric. The equipment this company makes are usually to save human life as they are “safety instruments” used by workers while carrying out work on the field.
This malware had successfully override the program and the safety control workstation was controlled remotely via the hackers.
The hackers first passed controllers into the system to reprogram the security of the plant so that the attack couldn’t be spotted. | https://pentesttools.net/hackers-use-triton-to-hack-into-power-station-security-systems/ |
CryptoPrevent 8 is the latest version of the popular malware prevention software for devices running Microsoft's Windows operating system.
Windows users have quite the diverse selection of security tools at their disposal. Even if you ignore the options that Windows itself ships with, there is a variety of tools that users can install to improve their system's protection against malware threats.
CryptoPrevent falls into the supplemental category, meaning that it adds to the protection but should be used next to resident antivirus software or other protections.
We mentioned the first version of the program back in 2013 when first ransomware threats started to pick up pace.
The program has come a long way since the release of its first version back in 2013. The program relies heavily on Software Restriction Policies to block malware attacks. The most recent version of CryptoPrevent ships with about 4000 rules, which is ten times the number that version 7 of the program shipped with.
The program is relatively easy to use on first glance. The first screen that it displays prompts you to pick a protection plan. This plan determines the protection level, and goes from none at all to maximum in the free version. There is also an extreme setting that is only available for premium users, and an option to pick custom settings.
If you are unsure what to pick here, you may want to start with the default level as it is the recommended protection level.
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The Protection Settings tab lists some of the protective measures that CryptoPrevent 8 will apply to the system when plans are selected.
It lists the protected areas --- the %appdata% folder for instance --, whether program naming exploits are blocked (using double file extensions for instance), and whether certain Windows programs or features are blocked as well.
Other options that the program may enable are to block file types that are often used by malware (.scr, .pif or cpl), and to watch certain folders and block programs that show malware traits.
The Policy Editor tab is quite useful, as it lists all whitelisted and blacklisted files and folders. You can check the Software Restriction Policies folders there for instance by opening the blacklist, or add folders or files to the whitelist to allow their execution.
Options are included to remove selected folders from the blacklist. This is useful in particular if you run into execution issues on the system after enabling one of CryptoPrevents plans.
One of the issues that I had personally with earlier program versions of CryptoPrevent was that it did not really reveal what it was doing, and that you had even less control over the functionality.
A CryptoPrevent monitoring service runs in the background after you apply a protection plan to the device. You can undo changes at any time by loading the program again. I suggest you set the protections to none before you uninstall the program on a device just to be on the safe side.
It only check for read+write rights in the folder RanSim start.
Of course the folder need read rights, other the programm cant start.
So if you block that stuff, then your safe. This programm doesnt test this well.
“Some years ago, I decided to register “foolishtech.com†to start a blog for voicing some common issues and resolutions I had experienced in my years as a PC repair technician. Scrolling down the page to confirm my site purchase I saw “foolishit.com†in the registrar’s suggestion box of similar names, and I couldn’t stop laughing, I had to have it!
We realize that “FoolishIT.com†doesn’t make for a great domain name. In addition to other various issues, the major roadblocks early on were being unable get a Microsoft Application ID, and for years we couldn’t get this domain on Google Apps, all due to the last 4 characters of the 9 character domain name. It seems some automated algorithms think it’s profane! Regardless, Foolish IT is now a long established entity thanks in part to our CryptoPrevent malware prevention software, it would be FOOLISH to change the name now!”
There’s worse : http://hpics.li/cfe8986
Funny anecdote. Choosing such a domain name with “FoolishIT.com†in mind and keeping it with a perceived “Foolishit.com†signs a most valuable sens of humor. Unfortunately as always, and whatever the quality of the site/blog/software, it will always be that some opponents grab a funny name as an argument for condemning an application. That’s life :)
More seriously I read in the article here that CryptoPrevent’s default plan “blocks vssadmin.exe, syskey.exe and cipher.exe”. I read elwewhare (I believe on FoolishIT itself) that, “This option prevents SYSKEY.EXE, CIPHER.EXE, BCDEDIT.EXE, and VSSADMIN.EXE from running (in any location,) as it is being exploited by recent malware. NOTE: any software requiring an automated special reboot sequence (e.g. booting AUTOMATICALLY into safe mode, recovery mode, a recovery partition, etc. etc.) may fail with this protection option enabled!”
Would you be as so kind, Brantley, to confirm if the four above EXEs are blocked, or are they less or more to be blocked?
For the time being I’ve searched info about vssadmin.exe and found several sites advising to disable it. I haven’t searched for info regarding the three other EXEs mentioned above, but I did do the following as for other EXEs already concerned in order to order Win7 to not tun those files :
In the Reg under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\DisallowRun I’ve added “10”=”vssadmin.exe” (already 9 other String values in the list). Also, since my system backupper is AOMEI I’ve changed its setting regarding VSS so that AOMEI uses its “built-in technique to backup without interrupting” rather than Microsoft’s VSS….
All four of those EXEs could be blocked and are blocked through the various plans in CryptoPrevent. However, one of the great thing about CryptoPrevent is you can enable/disable particular protections fairly easily (either through the Policy Editor as Martin pointed out, or through the Protection Settings tabs). For those particular blocks, it’s adding Software Restriction Policies in Windows so if you make changes to those to ensure they have taken place you will want to reboot (they would eventually apply on their own, but gpupdate is a bit strange on when it chooses to perform it’s tasks; where reboot would ensure it process any changes that have been made)
As for each of those programs, the Default plan will have SYSKEY.EXE, CIPHER.EXE, and VSSADMIN.EXE blocked. We’ve seen little to no “legitimate” usage outside of some specific case administrative tasks to use SYSKEY.EXE or CIPHER.EXE. Those should normally be fine being blocked in most all cases (syskey has recently been making a comeback in tech scam calls to lock the target out of their computer).
SYSKEY.EXE – https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/310105
CIPHER.EXE – https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb490878.aspx
VSSADMIN.EXE and BCDEDIT.EXE can be, and regularly are, used in more legitimate ways. Normally, VSSADMIN.EXE has a more specific case usage, but is also heavily used by ransomware to remove backup copies of targeted files – which is why it is included in the Default Plan protections. The most commonly used program we’ve come across is ShadowExplorer (great program), which makes it easy to browse the various backup versions. Generally, that is used in a specific case scenario, where disabling that protection and rebooting would not be too detrimental to accomplishing your goal. BCDEDIT.EXE is different, that is why it’s included in the Maximum and high plans. BCDEDIT.EXE is used by some backup utilities (when performing system image creation), remote access tool (when rebooting into safe mode w/ networking) and many other legitimate programs. At the same time it can be used maliciously to prevent access to booting the system. It’s fairly rare that ransomware will take this course of action, but it’s included because it has been done before. Disabling this protection can be done on a case by case basis; or left disabled depending on the software you use normally, without much fear of malicious intent.
You can find more about the legitimate uses of those with these pages:
VSSADMIN.EXE – https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc754968(v=ws.11).aspx
BCDEDIT.EXE – https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/commercialize/manufacture/desktop/bcdedit-command-line-options
Furthermore, the Maximum and higher plans can also cause some programs to have issues with installation and updating. This is mainly due to the “%localappdata%\*” and “blocking executables from temporarily extracted archives” protections. %localappdata%\* will block the user’s %temp% folder, where some programs will extract to the root of and execute from there to perform their install/update tasks. Similarly with the executables temporarily extracted from archives, however, more people seem to have trouble when they open a executable and then want to double click an executable from directly within the archive instead of extracting and then executing.
For any of the protections in the Maximum or higher protection plans, when you come to these specific tasks, you can lower the protection settings or disable the particular ones prior to performing these operations; and then re-enable them after you have completed. Just note that it will normally require a reboot to ensure you see the desired effects when removing or adding protections.
Hope that helps some and always feel free to reach out to our support staff through our various means described here: https://www.foolishit.com/support/ if you ever have any questions or would like recommendations. We even have a live stream (details on that support page) every weekday where you can chat directly with us directly and get demos/examples and discussions.
@Brantley Strickland (Foolish IT), thanks for these explanations. It appears that only the Maximum and high plans (in which blocking of BCDEDIT.EXE is included) could be problematic given the software run by the user, that a simple switch in CryptoPrevent enables/disables a given blocking (with a nevertheless advised reboot).
Blocking SYSKEY.EXE, CIPHER.EXE, and VSSADMIN.EXE, all three in the default plan, is less likely to be problematic (hence in the default plan). I note the links you provide.
Now I know better. In case of any further questions I’ll contact the Support page of FoolishIT.com.
That is a perfectly measured response from a vendor to a criticism. It is good to see a vendor defend their position rather than treat posters as shrills.
I used this program on PCs not long after it was first introduced – as a layered security approach. I agree with Martin, I really was not sure if it was actually doing anything meaningful. Unfortunately, it messed with my backups with the highest level of protection enabled. I wanted to just temporarily disable it before I ran a backup or before I installed a new software package, but it was not easily done. I eventually uninstalled it.
When they announced Vers 8, I decided to give them another try using the default setting. It has not interfered with my backups or interfered with the installation of new software either.
I am mostly concerned right now with the different approaches ransomware infects systems. The bad guys have already proven that they can hit the firmware in PCs and bricked them permanently. In a small business this can be death by a thousand cuts.
Once ransomware has gotten past all the layers of security it is meant as a last line of defense. In our testing it works fairly well with normally only the honeypot files getting encrypted, but there are various styles and speed of encryption with ransomware so it may get some legitimate user files. If this gets triggered and the data is important to the user, shutting down and having the system cleaned in an offline state (attaching drive to another system or using a boot environment) is the only real way to ensure you can regain access to those files or clean the system without the possibility of further encryption occurring.
The best way to avoid having to worry about ransomware entirely is a well planned and executed backup routine. Our philosophy has always been if something is important to you it should be in more than two locations.
Thanks Brantley, I obviously didn’t look at things properly, sorry.
Do you know, I have about 20 bonafide programs that run themselves from within one of the protected locations – Resilio Sync, Skype, Spotify, What’s App, Wire, Avira Scout, etc., etc.
I’d be interested to understand why so many program developers and now setting their .exe locations to folders that are usually protected by anti-exploit programs such as CryptoPrevent and to know whether I could have installed any of these programs in the Program Files folder without problems?
Normally those programs are trying to install user specific applications and make it the easiest for people to get those programs installed. It’s not what we would recommend as there are a number of ways to program user specific applications without using those locations for your program files themselves. The locations are normally “application data”, which is what those folder should be used for (data from the application) and not to circumvent the program files file permission restrictions Windows has put in place by default. Essentially those programs are trying to make it so non-admin users can install their programs and it’s basically circumventing protections that are there for good reason.
As far as dealing with them you can whitelist them in CryptoPrevent to allow them to run using the “Whitelist applications in all blocked location” button, but I would still highly recommend researching everything that gets whitelisted and removing ones you may not actually want to run. It’s unlikely that they would allow you to choose the path to install, but if they do I don’t see any reason why you wouldn’t be allowed install/run those applications from there. You may end up having to make changes to the folder permissions specific folder where you end up having them installed to, but shouldn’t be that big of an issue overall.
I just recently discovered this product and just today upgraded to v 8.0.4.0 free. I (basically) understand the ‘gadget’ issue … they being insecure … supposedly. I am not a security expert, .. but there were a couple of (actually only 1) gadget(s) I am very fond of.
So .. here is the question …. is ONE gadget just as risky as several? Are some risky and some are not? If I were to properly assume my favorite is safe … how can I white list it with this version?
The primary question is can I white list … the secondary question is ‘are all gadgets risky?”
For what it’s worth, I have recently been told by a (supposedly) white hat hacker that Windows is so full of holes that typical antivirus/antimalware products are useless, that Windows has 300+ back door vulnerabilities, Linux maybe 2-3. His advice was “there is no way to make Windows secure. It is hopeless. Ya want security, go to Linux”. Sooo, in THAT sense, it seems it doesn’t really matter if one runs gadgets or not.
I would just LIKE to have my one gadget back. Comments are welcome. Thanx.
No-one really knows if it is good or not.
In the below review, CryptoPrevent has been reviewed as “Dismal” and not worth the hassle of installing: https://www.pcmag.com/review/353931/cryptoprevent-premium-8
In another PC magazine, it also mentioned users whose computers / laptops have crashed, froze and the fact that CryptoPrevent is difficult uninstall.
It’s really up to the user in general. Is it worth the hassle? Do you “feel” safer with CryptoPrevent installed? Does your machine still work as normal?
Not getting viruses / malware / ransomware means a lot of common sense being used, like not clicking on and opening that spam / unknown email, not downloading or opening strange email attachments, not clicking on links in strange / unknown emails, being wearey of going to strange websites, especially in a language you cannot read, and having a good ad-blocker. | https://www.ghacks.net/2017/01/09/cryptoprevent-8-windows-malware-prevention-software/ |
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